printRing’s Hidden Data Let Us Map Amazon's Sprawling Home Surveillance Network
by ButterflyEffect
However, a Gizmodo investigation, which began last month and ultimately revealed the potential locations of up to tens of thousands of Ring cameras, has cast new doubt on the effectiveness of the company’s privacy safeguards. It further offers one of the most “striking” and “disturbing” glimpses yet, privacy experts said, of Amazon’s privately run, omni-surveillance shroud that’s enveloping U.S. cities.
Testing revealed that some coordinates were accurate enough to place a person directly in front of a Ring device; roughly four-to-six feet from home addresses volunteered by Neighbors users. Other coordinates fell just within eyeshot, pointing to the nearest intersection.
The Ring data has given Gizmodo the means to consider scenarios, no longer purely hypothetical, which exemplify what daily life is like under Amazon’s all-seeing eye. In the nation’s capital, for instance, walking the shortest route from one public charter school to a soccer field less than a mile away, 6th-12th graders are recorded by no fewer than 13 Ring cameras.