The ring cancels the partnership of the herd among the wider concerns of surveillance
The Amazon-owned ring has canceled its planned partnership with Flock Safety, a license plate recognition company, amid a broader review of the possibility of security cameras being used as surveillance and law enforcement tools.
In a statement Thursday afternoon, Ring said the companies had made a “joint decision to cancel the planned merger,” saying it would “require more time and resources than anticipated.” Ring said the integration was not implemented and no customer videos were shared.
This comes days after Ring’s Super Bowl ad for its AI-powered Search Party feature for finding lost dogs sparked backlash from critics who said it could be used for surveillance. That’s despite Ring’s assurances that the feature gives camera owners full control over how to share photos with owners of stray dogs, citing their extensive privacy policies.
The Herd partnership was not directly related to the Search Squad feature, but was referenced in media coverage as evidence of Ring’s extensive cooperation with law enforcement.
The partnership, announced in October, would allow local law enforcement agencies using Flock platforms to send video requests directly to the Ring’s Neighbors app during ongoing investigations. Calling users can choose to share the video or ignore the request.
Flock’s technology is used by thousands of police departments. Civil liberties groups including the ACLU have raised concerns that the video could eventually be accessed by federal agencies.
Ring said it has no relationship with ICE and does not share the video with the agency.
The company’s Public Requests feature, which allows local law enforcement to request photos from nearby Ring users during active investigations, is still active. Participation is optional, allowing users to choose to share photos or ignore the request.
Rival home security company Nest, which is owned by Google, has been placed separately in the case of Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance, where investigators this week obtained video from a Nest doorbell camera that had no active registration, with the help of Google.
Speaking to CBS News on Thursday afternoon, Ring founder Jamie Siminoff noted that Ring’s system is designed so that video data is not available to users without registration, distinguishing Ring’s approach from what happened in Guthrie’s case.
Siminoff emphasized that Community Applications allows police to request videos from Ring customers in a “privacy-protected manner,” and said the program is already helping investigations, including a shooting near Brown University in December.
He also used visibility to defend Search Party, saying the feature was built “privacy first” and compared it to finding a lost dog in your yard and calling the number on a whim.
Cats, he said, are next.
