Private security footage is nothing new to criminal investigations, but two factors are rapidly changing the landscape: huge growth in the number of devices with cameras, and the fact that footage usually lands in a cloud server, rather than on a tape.
When a third party maintains the footage on the cloud, it gives police the ability to seek the images directly from the storage company, rather than from the resident or business owner who controls the recording device. In 2022, the Ring security company, owned by Amazon, admitted that it had provided audio and video from customer doorbells to police without user consent at least 11 times. The company cited “exigent circumstances.”
Obligatory reminder that just getting into a car (or walking past one) is considered by pretty much every car manufacturer to be acceptance of their privacy policy:
It’s supported by the famous first principle of Descartes: I think, therefore I accept the terms of service
Should there be an expectation of privacy in public? Definitely wrong for footage to be able to wirelessly, without the owners consent, leave a car.
Should there be an expectation of privacy in public?
No, but there should be an expectation of not being recorded by every car you come across.
Again, the expectation in public is that you don’t have privacy.
The expectation I would have is that your own car isn’t going to collect evidence that could be used against you. And that it won’t collect data in your own garage or on your property.
Someone set off a bomb close to my house. Police asked me questions about it (time, what it sounded like, etc). They noticed I had security cameras and inquired what I had. The dumbfounded look when I said Ubiquiti (they’ve never heard of it) and that all footage was recorded locally on a hard drive. Like they didn’t understand what that meant - obviously they were looking for an answer such as “google” or “amazon” so they could just circumvent me.
I have their routers and stuff! It’s way overkill but I was having such major issues with the all in one routers one usually gets.
But they still won’t catch the delivery packages thieves.
You should always assume any camera to be hostile, unless you have full and complete control over all related software and connections.
Basically, the people who supplied the device will always have more control over it than you do. And big tech just looooves to abuse that and/or cave in to pressure from governments and police agencies.
A lesson for people that think proprietary internet connected cameras are a good idea. You can literally make open source cameras with a SBC like raspberry pi as the controller. And then using a VPN, you can connect to it from the outside.
Compare this to the setup for a Google camera: Plug it in, scan a QR code from the Home app, and that’s it. I understand there are security implications, but I’m not particular concerned about privacy in my backyard.
Sadly, since our country is governed by dinosaurs, the responsibility falls on us to help our friends and family avoid sketchy cameras that force the use of their cloud services.
At least until we can convince them to elect people who weren’t born before computers were invented.
