Ring is taking a backhanded approach to sharing video with police

The Neighbors app of the Ring Police: How to request video clips from users in a particular area instead of privately contacting people

Ring has faced criticism about its relationship with law enforcement for years. In 2019, a report from Motherboard revealed that Ring was working with police to help them convince device owners to hand over their security footage. The company allows law enforcement agencies to request footage from specific users through Amazon. However, Ring adjusted its policy in 2021 to require police to publicly request clips in the Neighbors app from users living in a specific area, rather than contacting people privately.

Ring is bringing other features to its Neighbors app, including a “Ring Moments” post category that is supposed to let users share more than just clips about crime and safety. It has a “curated selection of Ring videos”, which may make the app look like a bigger version of TikTok. It’s still not clear how Amazon picks these videos (users can opt out), but it reminds me a little too much of that Ring Nation TV show that civil rights groups urged Amazon to cancel.

Mapping the Neighborhoods Public Safety Service to Protect the Rights of Residents: The Case for a Ring-Based Surveillance Prevention Program

Yarger says that the emergency requests are reviewed by trained professionals who disclose information only when legal standards are met. In an emergency, the police can get video footage without a warrant. Google will also show footage from Nest devices to police in emergencies, no warrant required.

The RFA tool was shut down, but a senior policy analyst at the Electronic Frontier Foundation warned that it followed years of cozy relationships with police, and that it was not in the right direction. He stated that Ring might do more to protect the rights of community members, for example by allowing end-to-end encryption by default.

The program appeared to be highly successful. A December 2019 Gizmodo investigation that mapped Ring’s surveillance network using metadata from videos posted to the Neighbors app found that cities around the United States were blanketed by Ring cameras, subjecting residents to widespread surveillance. The Washington Post found that Ring had partnered with more than 400 police departments in the US as of August 2019—a figure that rose to more than 2,100 by July 2022, according to a letter Ring sent to US senator Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, who has introduced legislation that attempts to place limits on corporate-run surveillance networks like Ring’s. Ring does not say whether it will maintain its program with police, but Yarger noted that law enforcement will continue to use the Neighbors Public Safety service to post helpful information to their community residents.