Amazon Doubles Down on Ring Partnerships with Law Enforcement (opens in new tab)

I sort of wish there was more polls on issues like this. What percentage, of the general population, thinks it is beneficial to have security cameras share information with the police?

My house was broken into a couple years ago. Windows smashed and the place vandalized. I felt violated for months. I had no security footage then and the police said it was a waste of time to dust for fingerprints. I wish I had Ring then - I do now. I am happy now that thieves know when they approach my house now they are being filmed and shared with police.

I know the Hacker News crowd is very against this - in a very out of touch way - but I am extremely pro being able to share footage from my private residence with law enforcement and am happy local law enforcement may finally have some tools to solve repeat burglaries.

From the article, this simply creates a portal that allows the police to request Ring owners in one area to share footage with them, and it is up to the owners to then agree, at which point I expect the Ring device will automatically send the requested footage to the police.

If that's indeed what they do I really don't see any issues, on the contrary that sounds like the way forward.

Currently police has to go door to door to ask neighbours if they have any CCTV and then get the SD cards or what not in order to recover footage.

A use-case in Amazon's interests would be using Ring as a way to combat package theft and monitor Amazon deliveries. It's a feasible method for Amazon to save on "shrinkage" and boost their bottom line by using Ring and/or Blink.

Given Ring is a doorbell, the chance that it's going to help cops stop murders or serious crime seems a bit of a far-fetched marketing statement, and it's more likely to catch petty theft and porch pirates.