Amazon Ring recently announced new limitations on how police can get Ring video camera footage from homeowners.
Experts explain the company will now require police to get a warrant to access doorbell video.
Previously, police were able to request and receive footage directly from users in the social networking app “Neighbors”.
News
Ring and its doorbell cameras have partnered with over 400 police departments
According to a Ring blog post, “This week, we are also sunsetting the Request for Assistance (RFA) tool. Public safety agencies like fire and police departments can still use the Neighbors app to share helpful safety tips, updates, and community events. They will no longer be able to use the RFA tool to request and receive video in the app. Public safety agency posts are still public, and will be available for users to view on the Neighbors app feed and on the agency's profile.”
Police can also directly ask homeowners for their videos.
“It's another challenge that law enforcement will have to work through.” Gloucester County Sheriff Darrell Warren Jr. said, “Investigations can be rapidly evolving and sometimes adding these additional layers can delay getting a dangerous individual off of the street.”
But he is not overly concerned about the change to the Ring policy.
Privacy advocates and groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation, E.F.F., a civil liberties nonprofit, consider this move from Amazon to be a win.
“E.F.F. has been part of a very large coalition of civil liberties groups, civil rights groups, racial justice groups which have for the past 5 years or so really been pushing Amazon to think about who it serves and who it's hurting by having such a cozy relationship with police departments,” said Dr. Matthew Guariglia, an Electronic Frontier Foundation Senior Policy Analyst.
Scripps News
Ring will no longer allow police to request doorbell camera footage
He said Ring cameras have become a tool to put certain communities under a microscope for the past five years.
“Specifically, Black communities in the United States are under a tremendous amount of surveillance and when you put any community under that level of scrutiny, police are going to find reasons to harass people and ticket people," said Guariglia.
However, others we spoke to want police to have immediate access to video and don’t see a problem with it. They think the change could be harmful to solving crimes.
We asked Dennis Slocumb, the vice president International Union of Police Associations, what he thought about the change.
He said, “We don't panic when companies make a decision that puts a little more work on us. We understand both sides of it, and detectives will overcome. They'll just start knocking on more doors and need to get a search warrant. It's just police work. It's detective work. For God sakes, we were solving crimes long before there were ring doorbells.”
We also reached out to police departments in Hampton Roads:
NEWPORT NEWS:
NNPD does use Ring and the Ring Public Safety ”Neighbors” app on occasion to seek footage from incidents in our area. With this change, users cannot upload footage directly to law enforcement through the Ring app any longer. However, agencies can still make online posts or in-person requests for footage, it would just need to be sent to the investigators through another method rather than directly through Ring. So while this may make investigations slightly more time consuming, NNPD does not feel this significantly impacts its ability to investigate crimes.
Here is a link on the Ring website which explains a little more about the change and may add some more context to the original announcement from last week.
With this change, public safety agencies can still share important updates and ask for help from their communities by posting to the Neighbors app feed. They can still ask for information and video related to an incident in their neighborhood, but instead of the video being delivered directly through the Neighbors app, agencies must provide instructions on how the resident should deliver the video to them (e.g., via email or third-party evidence management). For example, if an agency is investigating an incident, they may still create a crime or safety post explaining what happened and asking their community for help. This post should include an officer's email or method of contact. When users see the post in their feed, if they choose, they can still download and share videos using their preferred method (email, text), they simply will be unable to share directly through the app. Click here [help.publicsafety.ring.com] to learn about Agency Posting.
NNPD does use Ring and the Ring Public Safety ”Neighbors” app on occasion to seek footage from incidents in our area. With this change, users cannot upload footage directly to law enforcement through the Ring app any longer. However, agencies can still make online posts or in-person requests for footage, it would just need to be sent to the investigators through another method rather than directly through Ring. So while this may make investigations slightly more time consuming, NNPD does not feel this significantly impacts its ability to investigate crimes.
CHESAPEAKE POLICE DEPARTMENT:
We understand there is a need to maintain a balance between protecting the privacy of citizens and the ability of law enforcement to investigate serious crimes. Businesses such as Ring have supported law enforcement’s efforts and we hope to continue having their support by quickly providing videos related to criminal investigations when we obtain search warrants.
While it may in some cases, citizens and businesses are still able to voluntarily provide us with the same videos when they are requested for criminal investigations, which is the method we receive nearly all videos we obtain now.
We are hopeful that citizens and businesses voluntarily provide videos we need for criminal investigations when requested by our detectives. In cases that we must obtain a search warrant and are quickly provided the requested videos or other evidence, the public danger may be reduced.
