Amazon Ring Security Cams

Amazon’s Ring security cameras and video doorbells are the most widely used home video cameras in many parts of the world today. As one expert from US privacy org the Electronic Frontier Foundation put it, "Ring has steadily been becoming one of the largest surveillance apparatuses in the nation.” And as wise comic book prophet Stan Lee reminds us, “With great power comes great responsibility.” Has Amazon Ring lived up to that great responsibility? Not exactly.

Ring has a history of not protecting users' privacy. At one point they reportedly stored customer data--including video recordings--unencrypted on an Amazon cloud server and employees could access any of this data. There have also been reported data leaks and concerns that the Ring Doorbell app is full of third-party trackers tracking a good amount of personal information that Amazon Ring doesn’t disclose. They have gotten more transparent in their privacy and data deletion practices, which we appreciate. And they added two-factor authentication to help protect users in 2020, which was a great step forward. One we here at Mozilla pushed hard for.

Then there is the problematic relationship Ring has with law enforcement where questions of racism, warrantless surveillance, and police overreach still linger. While Amazon says they are distancing themselves from law enforcement access to users' video and requiring more transparency in the process, they are still facilitating law enforcement access with this product and the Neighbors app and that leaves us concerned.

Finally, there are the questions of privacy violations of the neighbors of people who use home surveillance cameras — not just Ring but all of home surveillance cameras. A recent court case in the UK highlighted this when a woman sued her neighbor for infringing on her privacy when his Ring security cameras were found pointed at her home. Not only could his cameras see her, they could also listen to her as well. She won her case and $137,000.

All in all, these security cameras still raise too many questions about transparency, data protection, public safety and racism in our opinion and we feel could come with *privacy not included.