As suburban police tout the crime-fighting benefits of striking deals for access to video from Amazon’s Ring doorbell cameras, several critics, including a prominent civil-rights organization, are raising concerns about privacy and about law enforcement helping a private company build a surveillance network.
In nearly 1½ years, Ring, with its associated Neighbors app, has gained relationships with at least 90 police departments in Illinois — many clustered in the suburbs, according to a company map. Aurora was the first Illinois department to link with Ring in September 2018, and Palatine, Schaumburg, Barrington and Libertyville are among this year’s newcomers.
But those deals could be troubling to residents who don’t support police teaming with Amazon’s subsidiary, said Ed Yohnka, spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois. Elected officials should place the Ring contracts on an agenda for debate and public approval, he said, even though no money is involved.
Read more in the Daily Herald here.