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Amazon's Ring Reportedly Partners With 200 Law Enforcement Agencies (vice.com) 73

Posted by BeauHD from the secret-partnerships dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: At least 200 law enforcement agencies around the country have entered into partnerships with Amazon's home surveillance company Ring, according to an email obtained by Motherboard via public record request. Ring has never disclosed the exact number of partnerships that it maintains with law enforcement. However, the company has partnered with at least 200 law enforcement agencies, according to notes taken by a police officer during a Ring webinar, which he emailed to himself in April. It's possible that the number of partnerships has changed since the day the email was sent. The officer who sent the email told Motherboard that the email was a transcribed version of handwritten notes that he took during a team webinar with a Ring representative on April 9. Additional emails obtained by Motherboard indicate that this webinar trained officers on how to use the "Law Enforcement Neighborhood Portal." This portal allows local police to see a map with the approximate locations of all Ring cameras in a neighborhood, and request footage directly from camera owners. Owners need to consent, but police do not need a warrant to ask for footage. "This doesn't surprise me at all, and it's the perfect example of how corporate surveillance and government surveillance are inextricably linked," Evan Greer, deputy director of Fight for the Future, told Motherboard. "Amazon is building a for-profit surveillance dragnet and partnering with local law enforcement agencies in ways that avoid any form of oversight or accountability that police departments might normally be required to adhere to."

"It's time to come to grips with the fact that the 1984 dystopian future we all fear isn't something a future authoritarian government might impose," Greer told Motherboard, "it's something that's being built right now, in plain sight, through partnerships between private companies and government agencies."
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Amazon's Ring Reportedly Partners With 200 Law Enforcement Agencies More

Amazon's Ring Reportedly Partners With 200 Law Enforcement Agencies

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  • Again? (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    This was posted yesterday. Dupe.

    • Maybe they've just partnered with another 200 law enforcement agencies, for a total of 400.

      Or maybe BeauHD is just lazy and posting dupes. Because he's a dumbass.

      • And you have to wonder how long it will be before the police start abusing this. I mean come on - it's rife for it.

    • Some people might not have surveilled it the first time. We must partner with more agencies and increase content retention!

  • Slashdot reportedly posts 200 dupes (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Slashdot reportedly posts 200 dupes

  • Groundhog Day? (Score:5, Informative)

    by forkfail ( 228161 ) on Tuesday July 30, 2019 @09:17AM (#59011372)

    I open up Slashdot this morning, and it looks exactly the same as yesterday.... [slashdot.org]

  • At least... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Well at least they waited until the next day to post this dup. Progress?

  • Thank you Captain Obvious (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Comboman ( 895500 ) on Tuesday July 30, 2019 @09:25AM (#59011408)

    Owners need to consent, but police do not need a warrant to ask for footage.

    That's how things have always been. Police canvas the neighborhood asking if anyone saw anything. People can choose to cooperate or not. Warrants are only needed if the property owner is uncooperative and the police have a reasonable suspicion there is valuable evidence. Stop trying to make is seem unreasonable for people to monitor their own property. BTW, Ring footage has also been used against the police to prove misconduct.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      that's cute, you think owners actually need to 'consent' when 'secret letters' and deals between corporations and the feds exist, and the fact owners willingly give the data to a third party... don't need a warrant for third party data (see also: cell phone location data, et al)

    • Basically amazon was tired of fielding calls from law enforcement asking which residents had surveillance and made a law enforcement portal because it was cheaper than staffing phones and verifying the caller's identity.

      You are not wrong the police have always been able to ask for security video and even without a warrant or any legal obligation home owners are often more than happy to help because they would like the those vandalizing, breaking in to homes, cars etc... caught and out of their neighborhood.

    • Fucked up choice of words.
      reasonable suspicion is a legal term and NO a warrant can not be issued on Reasonable Suspicion but upon PROBABLE CAUSE a (theoretically) far more difficult standard to achieve

  • Seems that we already discussed this a while back.

    https://tech.slashdot.org/stor... [slashdot.org]

  • They don't need a warrant to *ask* -- but: (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    ..but you don't *have* to give them anything either.

    Of course, if Amazon gives it to them anyway, it's all moot. Check your TOS!

  • So people want to use camera's to monitor their homes? And the police can ask a homeowner for permission to see recordings if they believe it might help solve a crime? Seems legit, this kind of this already happens, seems like its just a little more organized.

    Am I missing something? Obviously outside the scope of "but what if they eventually stop asking" but you could apply that logic to just about anything.

    "I heard Bill Perterson went to the ...dentist" " Yeah he had his teeth cleaned" " But what if the

    • You don't understand. This is the start of a police state. What if I want to smoke pot in my backyard and my neighbor catches it on his Ring cam? I could then get arrested. Also, what if I refuse to hand over video from my cam? The police will just get a warrant and then search my home and find my pot.

      • Than the issue should be about unjustified laws not the cameras themselves.
        Maybe this will finally encourage people to change laws that don't provide any benefits and elect politicians that support the change, instead of letting them exist because you know you can get away with breaking them.

  • Circumventing Warrants (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Must be nice to get neighbors to roll over on each other and destroy trust in their communities. It accomplishes two things:

    a) It turns community members against each other and puts them on the team of the "state" and
    b) it circumvents the need for probable cause to track someone

    It's a win-win for big government.

    • Must be nice to get neighbors to roll over on each other and destroy trust in their communities. It accomplishes two things:

      a) It turns community members against each other and puts them on the team of the "state" and
      b) it circumvents the need for probable cause to track someone

      It's a win-win for big government.

      In my neighborhood the footage is only used for crimes, like people checking for unlocked car doors, and stealing packages, and usually shared on the closed neighborhood facebook page.

      So yeah, kind of the opposite. Can you name one example where this would divide people?

      I didn't fucking think so. Think before you type stupid shit into your computer.

      And if catching my Neighbor pissing on my tulips tears the neighborhood trust apart , then so be it, he's a sick fucker and deserves to pay for what he has done

      • Just wait until they are used for:

        * Parking enforcement: You parked too many days in front of your own house, here's an e-ticket
        * HOA: Your grass is too long
        * City bylaws: It snowed and you didn't shovel within 12 hours
        * Child services: Your kids have been playing too long without adequate supervision

    • I'm confused. How is "breaking trust" between community members? Please explain more.

    • If my neighbors are going to open my car's doors at 3 in the morning and steal things out of it, they don't deserve my trust.

      To seize security footage, police need a warrant (issued after determination of probable cause), but they can ask for whatever they want.
    • How does an increase in accountability destroy trust? Please explain.

  • My small town is one of the cities participating in the Ring program. The PD blitzed all the local facebook groups and the local newspaper with an offer for a steeply discounted Ring doorbell camera. As far as I can tell a lot of people signed up for it. People will easily accept 'free' without thinking about what comes along with it.

  • If the cops would bother patrolling... (Score:3)

    by LostMyAccount ( 5587552 ) on Tuesday July 30, 2019 @10:24AM (#59011656)

    ...we might have less property theft that causes people to embrace surveillance technology.

    Around here, the cops are both about 20-40% below the staffing level for a city of our size and so hemmed in by rules designed to limit profiling that they don't even bother patrolling middle class neighborhoods.

    Cars are regularly ransacked, garages broken into, packages stolen and there's nothing anyone's doing about it.

    The shit show on Nextdoor is hilarious to watch -- about 75% of the people are incensed about the crime, but a solid 25% are seething with rage that someone would call the cops on suspicious people in the neighborhood, mostly because they might be people of color, who of course have every right to walk down alleys at 3 AM and peek into cars so long as they don't steal anything.

    I mean, we're reaping what we've sown. The cops are underfunded, and when they are funded they waste money and manpower on stupid shit that has nothing to do with law enforcement or might cause them to have to exit their air conditioned cruisers. The left-wing activists are convinced that everything is racial profiling.

    And we act surprised when the majority of people are just pissed that the net product of their work effort is getting stolen and are embracing any technology they can to try to stop it?

    • "I mean, we're reaping what we've sown. The cops are underfunded, and when they are funded they waste money and manpower on stupid shit that has nothing to do with law enforcement or might cause them to have to exit their air conditioned cruisers. The left-wing activists are convinced that everything is racial profiling."
       
      100% correct on all counts. But you know, we libertarians on Slashdot don't like the police (don'tcha know?).

      • I mean there needs to be some middle ground.

        Not every black guy should be stopped at gun point for being in a white neighborhood. But really, people out at 3 am in a residential neighborhood ought to be stopped.

        IMHO, the policing methods need to be changed too. Why can't we have bike cops or foot patrols in neighborhoods? I feel like this improves community relations and the cops get a solid feel for who belongs or doesn't belong.

        • Any cop of any race in a big city will tell you that if you see someone in your neighborhood that doesn't seem to "belong" there and you feel is suspicious, report it. It really has nothing to do with race. Many people are uncomfortable with doing that, but they shouldn't be. Police aren't out patrolling the neighborhoods for the most part. There aren't enough police to cover everything. They need the neighborhood to tell them when there is suspicious behavior. That is life. If you call, they will send a pa

    • ...we might have less property theft that causes people to embrace surveillance technology.

      Around here, the cops are both about 20-40% below the staffing level for a city of our size and so hemmed in by rules designed to limit profiling that they don't even bother patrolling middle class neighborhoods.

      Cars are regularly ransacked, garages broken into, packages stolen and there's nothing anyone's doing about it.

      The shit show on Nextdoor is hilarious to watch -- about 75% of the people are incensed about the crime, but a solid 25% are seething with rage that someone would call the cops on suspicious people in the neighborhood, mostly because they might be people of color, who of course have every right to walk down alleys at 3 AM and peek into cars so long as they don't steal anything.

      I mean, we're reaping what we've sown. The cops are underfunded, and when they are funded they waste money and manpower on stupid shit that has nothing to do with law enforcement or might cause them to have to exit their air conditioned cruisers. The left-wing activists are convinced that everything is racial profiling.

      And we act surprised when the majority of people are just pissed that the net product of their work effort is getting stolen and are embracing any technology they can to try to stop it?

      Yeah more cops , more patrolling.

      Better yet maybe just a cop that stands right out front of my house. They could work in shifts, I don't expect the guy to go without sleep. 3 eight hour shifts should get it done, my ring doorbell can cover the overlap.

      The problem is that there aren't cop eyes on my shit every hour of every day. If there were the world would probably be a better place.

      Oh yeah and of course brown people, brown people are the real problem.

      Everyone in my neighborhood gets so super happy when

    • ...we might have less property theft that causes people to embrace surveillance technology.

      Around here, the cops are both about 20-40% below the staffing level for a city of our size and so hemmed in by rules designed to limit profiling that they don't even bother patrolling middle class neighborhoods.

      Cars are regularly ransacked, garages broken into, packages stolen and there's nothing anyone's doing about it.

      The shit show on Nextdoor is hilarious to watch -- about 75% of the people are incensed about the

  • Duplicate articles should be removed. Greer is incorrect in his assertion this is a corporate endeavor. It involves a corporation that enables the system, but its the people that own the cameras and right to share footage without a warrant.
    Its when cameras become mandatory that we should start losing our shit. To say its a 1984 dystopian future is ridiculous and distracts from legitimate discussion on the subject. Really the article is more aligned to clickbait than anything of value.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • I purchased* an Arlo video security system to use as a "Video Doorbell". Ha Ha Ha the delay was so long that it was useless. Why the delay? My video was going to a server "somewhere" and bouncing back, my response also had to go to the other side of the planet, all to talk to the door in my house.
    WHY?
    WHY is my video going somewhere (I can't control) and who, exactly, is in charge of it? Exact same thing for Ring.

    Well, the cops have someplace that is a central repository.
    The cops and anyone else. A. Tar

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