Amazon Ring Cashes in on Techno-Authoritarianism and Mass Surveillance

Submitted ⁨⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨drmoose@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨technology@lemmy.world⁩

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/07/amazon-ring-cashes-techno-authoritarianism-and-mass-surveillance

Ring founder Jamie Siminoff is back at the helm of the surveillance doorbell company, and with him is the surveillance-first-privacy-last approach that made Ring one of the most maligned tech devices. Not only is the company reintroducing new versions of old features which would allow police to request footage directly from Ring users, it is also introducing a new feature that would allow police to request live-st

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drmoose@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Who could have guessed that having billionaire owned always on surveillance device in your home would lead to this

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- devfuuu@lemmy.world [bot] ⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  It’s not like there’s been dozens of people warning about it in the last few years. People deserve what they get.
  
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skisnow@lemmy.ca ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I bought a cheap Chinese security camera for a fraction of the cost of a Ring and signed up for their cloud storage system. I’m more comfortable with the Chinese government being able to access footage of my backyard, than the current US administration.

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- chaosCruiser@futurology.today ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Not too long ago, that statement would have sounded controversial or even crazy. Nowadays though, I’m shocked how much sense it makes to me. Never thought that I would agree with a statement like that.
  
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  - avidamoeba@lemmy.ca ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Yeah. It’s crazy. I would choose neither because I can DIY something secure but for non-technical folks in the North America today the Chinese gov’t having your video is safer than a private US corporation.
    
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  - Rekorse@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    To be honest china is more likely to come to their defense than american police are.
    
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- drmoose@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Or you could choose an option that does neither. Why feed the autocrats at all?
  
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  - skisnow@lemmy.ca ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    eh, you might have a spare day to source a completely uncompromised camera and find someone in a trusted neutral country who runs an unproblematic hosting service and configure a system to do offsite storage in a secure way, but I’ve got other stuff going on.
    
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Junkernaught@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
So, what are people using to get:

good quality streaming

doorbell alert

motion alerts

local and remote access

recording storage

Currently using Ring (outside of America) and looking to migrate away. There are some nice other features like distinguishing motion vs people vs vehicles that are nice to have but can live without.
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- 7toed@midwest.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Home assistant + frigate has been serving myself and my family on separate sites for about 2 years. It has definitely kicked my ass, but seeing “privacy friendly” reolink cameras constantly phone home on my firewall assured me it was worth it. Wireguard tunnel in and you have remote access with practically no security concerns*
  
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  - spaghettiwestern@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
    2nd this configuration. My firewall rules block all camera external access and Frigate (once configured) is superb at detecting people without false alerts. It is disturbing just how much traffic smart devices try to send to China and Amazon even when not subscribed to cloud services. The open Wireguard ports appear closed to scanners so I’m also reasonably comfortable with network security.
    
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- moseschrute@lemmy.zip ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Ubiquiti. Cloud gateway max (router + NVR) for $200 with no storage, add your own 2tb nvme, get a ubiquiti doorbell for $300. Little pricy, but simple to setup and all the footage lives locally on the cloud gateway max. And you can add more cameras later. The cloud gateway max is an excellent 2.5G router. Slap on a WiFi 7 access point for $200 more and you got yourself a killer home network.
  
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  - Rekorse@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    This is the choice if you want to buy the equipment and it works out of the box. Its cheaper if you want to sort of build your own setup but requires more maintenance and setup.
    
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- Turret3857@infosec.pub ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Reolink Doorbell ( Firewalled from connecting outside LAN) + Frigate (self hosted)
  
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- drmoose@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  It’s solved tech and there are hundreds of alternatives so you can definitely find something local. I’ve heard Netatmo recommended for Europeans (French, gdpr compliant)
  
  www.netatmo.com/en-gb/smart-outdoor-camera
  
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  - tabular@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    There are many other cameras but most have the same potential to do this sort of shit. Sending video to some server you don’t control, on cameras you don’t control because it’s proprietary, isn’t going to cut it if privacy is your goal.
    
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- ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  The best thing is you don’t need any of that. Just install normal doorbell. We all love gadgets but some of them are just not worth it.
  
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  - Rekorse@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Hard agree. What does a video doorbell connected to the internet solve? I’m concerned that people dont trust their neighbors to this extent. Sort of a canary in the coal mine type thing.
    
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- projectsquared@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Just bought a Reolink rln46 NVR and four cameras. I don’t have the doorbell, but every other feature you requested works flawlessly. It records 24/7 in 4K but can stream at lower resolutions if you want when you’re away from home on mobile. You can set what notifications you receive and when you want to receive them. You can even go back and search for events by type in the recorded video when they were never flagged for notification in the first place. I’ve been thoroughly impressed and plan to add to the system in the coming months.
  
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  - toynbee@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    I also use Reolink, including both the NVR and doorbell, and have been very pleased with it.
    
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- chtk@feddit.nl ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I recently adopted a dog who I want to monitor when I’m away from home. So I got a cheap motion tracking in-home camera with cloud storage, and AI identification for people and pets. The AI functions never fucking worked. I already had a Ring camera.
  
  Did a bit of research after realising the cheapo camera was shit, and went for a eufy stack to replace the Ring doorbell and tbr shitty in-house camera.
  
  I now have:
  
  eufy Video Doorbell
  
  eufy HomeBase 3, with an added 1TB of storage
  
  eufy IndoorCam C220
  
  This gives me
  
  local storage for both cameras on the HomeBase.
  
  the HomeBase also gives you local AI for (individual) person, (general) pet, vehicle, and package identification. I haven’t tried the vehicle identification.
  
  streaming in the app for both cameras should work in 2k. I have it set to 1080p. It’s good enough for me.
  
  continuous recording is an option. I have it set to motion alerts because
  
  the app gives you motion and doorbell alerts. You can configure how much information you want in the notifications, to prevent video’s from passing through eufy’s servers.
  
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  - gesshoku@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    While this happened a few years ago, I’d still suggest to block it from accessing the internet/cloud in your firewall nonetheless.
    
    mjtsai.com/…/eufy-cameras-uploading-to-cloud-with…
    
    Even if it’s not on eufy’s end, there could always be a vulnerability.
    
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- vfsh@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  i use wyze, been solid for years esp for the price. local SD storage is a huge plus for me and the streaming quality is good and loads insanely fast. i have a handful of blink cameras around the property but never use them anymore bc the interface and UX is so shit
  
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- MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  You can run all of that on a Raspberry Pi, without third-party access and surveyllance.
  
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  - kinther@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Yes I did this years ago in 2013, but the problem for my family was accessing the recordings (basically I never set up remote access outside of our LAN)
    
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Plebcouncilman@sh.itjust.works ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I mean, people are not being forced to buy this shit. So it’s on the idiots who think they have nothing to hide. Just Google something like “why are people ok with cameras inside their house “ and you’ll see many many people basically saying “don’t care, I have nothing to hide, everyone has a pussy/dick”

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- drmoose@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  We still need to protect the idiots. Thats why we’re banning asbestos and have safety codes. How is this any different?
  
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  - MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    
    How is this any different?
    
    IT is new and too abstract for the old farts in ruling and judging.
    
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  - ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    We need to protect uninformed people. You do this by informing them. If they know the risks and still decide they don’t care it’s their problem, not ours.
    
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  - Plebcouncilman@sh.itjust.works ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Not if they are willingly bringing this inside their homes. I think it’s very different from substances that you might not be aware are there and are highly toxic.
    
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- tabular@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  People who claim they don’t value privacy are simply ignorant of how this can affect them. They don’t consider the data falling into the wrong hands. Surely they don’t want criminals with unauthorized access at least. It should be obvious that governments don’t always have their best interests either.
  
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  - Plebcouncilman@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    I mean, you might think that but you underestimate how willing people are to give up their privacy and freedom just to feel safe.
    
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- aceshigh@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  The cops can come to them to get video on you. So you’re impacted.
  
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snoons@lemmy.ca ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
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