A Super Bowl ad for Ring security cameras boasting how the company can scan neighborhoods for missing dogs has prompted some customers to remove or even destroy their cameras.
Online, videos of people removing or destroying their Ring cameras have gone viral. One video posted by Seattle-based artist Maggie Butler shows her pulling off her porch-facing camera and flipping it the middle finger.
Butler explained that she originally bought the camera to protect against package thefts, but decided the pet-tracking system raised too many concerns about government access to data.
“They aren’t just tracking lost dogs, they’re tracking you and your neighbors,” Butler said in the video that has more than 3.2 million views.
I honestly didn’t know what they were thinking with that commercial. Why would you proudly advertise that you’ve built a massive surveillance network, during one of the most-watched yearly televised events too for that matter? Did they seriously believe that there wouldn’t be a major backlash? I mean I appreciate the blunt honesty in that commercial so I’ll give them credit for that.
Presumably because most end users are in deep with the “if you do nothing wrong, you have nothing to worry about” crowd … and besides it can find a lost dog /s.
They brought these sorts of intrusive cameras in the first place so privacy was not top of mind, or even in 2nd or 3rd place.
I would also put a good bit of the blame on executives and marketing people being way out of touch with the average person.
Because in 3 weeks most people will forget about it. It’s brazen. They’ll still be the biggest doorbell company in America
They product does exactly what their customers want. Just the latter had not realised the implications for their own privacy, before the commercial, apparently.