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You have to ask yourself, why is a retail company (which started as an online bookstore) in the least bit interested in the police business? This is a disturbi

You have to ask yourself, why is a retail company (which started as an online bookstore) in the least bit interested in the police business? This is a disturbing trend. It seems that, as tech companies get larger, they are giving themselves over to the surveillance state with ever more enthusiasm.

tj-teej 8y ago
I would think it's to improve reliability of their deliveries. I see why you would be concerned, but retail stores have had security guards for my whole lifetime...
- mc32 8y ago
  Yep. Both Fed-Ex and Amazon have an interest in preventing theft as well as fraud (false claims of non-delivery), and they see a business opportunity in addition to shrinkage minimization with the perk of customer psychological comfort to boot.
  - mimixco 8y ago
    Give me a break. This is not about shoplifting in retail stores! Amazon is now helping cops surveille people in their own homes via Alexa and Ring.
    - mc32 8y ago
      Theft = vernacular porch piracy. Prevention = happy shoppers. Happy shoppers = more sales. More sales = happy company.
      - mimixco 8y ago
        You're naive if you think this about package theft. Show me one place where that is even mentioned on Ring's website or docs.
        mc32 8y ago
        Not sure about their marketing, but I know how and why people use it in their apartments and homes. If curious get on one of the mentioned neighborhood apps, see how people use these devices: package theft, suspicious people/cars, vagrants/unstable folks, public disturbance (skaboarders scratching cars, etc.,) early hours canvassing by thieves, etc...
      - mimixco 8y ago
        Shoppers do not care about package theft or any other loss- making properties of a business. Show me one place where package theft is even mentioned on Ring's website or in their doc. Is isn't. It naive to think that Amazon is worried about package theft and that's why they bought Ring. Too many other tech companies have signed up for the surveillance economy for that to be true. What's the real reason?
        Nasrudith 8y ago
        Loss aversion is a real thing - people can and do decide to go brick and mortar because of being afraid of package theft. It isn't realistically a big issue but people care about it a lot. As for why I would guess wanting better rates from turning bits to cash.
        masonic 8y ago
        Shoppers do not care about package theft Collectively, shoppers pay for all package theft.
        mimixco 8y ago
        That is true. But we also pay for pensions, profits, advertising, union-busting, pollution, and countless other things we may not want to pay for. Ultimately, the consumer only cares about what product he is getting and what price he has to pay. How the company juggles its losses or where they come from is of no interest to the product purchaser.
xenph 8y ago
Some of the most sophisticated crime labs in the US are owned by large retail entities. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/04/csi-walmart/521565/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/04/csi-w...
tracker1 8y ago
Easy.. package theft alone probably costs Amazon millions every year. If more customers have a doorbell camera that captures motion activity, more thieves can be caught, and the less theft will happen. It's actually a very good pairing.
- mimixco 8y ago
  That's a facile answer and doesn't explain why so many other big tech companies are signing up for the survelliance economy. Package theft is a drop in the bucket for Amazon and can't amount to more than the equivalent losses from shoplifting if they ran retail stores.
  - CryptoPunk 8y ago
    Package theft affects their margins. They will have a strong financial motive to minimize it. No conspiracy theory required. It's also a moral outrage, when a subset of the population blatantly preys on others, and perpetrating the vast majority of thefts while constituting a tiny proportion of the population. There needs to be a strong response to these types of people for the safety of everyone else.
  - tracker1 8y ago
    I was only answering for the Amazon case... the rest comes down to two things, in terms of home security, it's mostly driven by the consumer demand. As to general surveillance at larger levels part of it is maximizing the fractions of a penny. I mean, if you can sell a piece of data for a fraction of a cent, but have 50 billion fractions to sell, that's a pretty big hunk of change. There are also those genuinely concerned over $STATE$ security and working towards that as a goal. I'm not condoning or supporting or rejecting for that matter any of the above. But it really doesn't take too much to see several reasons why this stuff happens. As to the losses in relation to retail stores... retail stores generally have higher margins, and they still hire security staff and put up cameras.

tj-teej 8y ago

I would think it's to improve reliability of their deliveries. I see why you would be concerned, but retail stores have had security guards for my whole lifetime...

mc32 8y ago
Yep. Both Fed-Ex and Amazon have an interest in preventing theft as well as fraud (false claims of non-delivery), and they see a business opportunity in addition to shrinkage minimization with the perk of customer psychological comfort to boot.
- mimixco 8y ago
  Give me a break. This is not about shoplifting in retail stores! Amazon is now helping cops surveille people in their own homes via Alexa and Ring.
  - mc32 8y ago
    Theft = vernacular porch piracy. Prevention = happy shoppers. Happy shoppers = more sales. More sales = happy company.
    - mimixco 8y ago
      You're naive if you think this about package theft. Show me one place where that is even mentioned on Ring's website or docs.
      - mc32 8y ago
        Not sure about their marketing, but I know how and why people use it in their apartments and homes. If curious get on one of the mentioned neighborhood apps, see how people use these devices: package theft, suspicious people/cars, vagrants/unstable folks, public disturbance (skaboarders scratching cars, etc.,) early hours canvassing by thieves, etc...
    - mimixco 8y ago
      Shoppers do not care about package theft or any other loss- making properties of a business. Show me one place where package theft is even mentioned on Ring's website or in their doc. Is isn't. It naive to think that Amazon is worried about package theft and that's why they bought Ring. Too many other tech companies have signed up for the surveillance economy for that to be true. What's the real reason?
      - Nasrudith 8y ago
        Loss aversion is a real thing - people can and do decide to go brick and mortar because of being afraid of package theft. It isn't realistically a big issue but people care about it a lot. As for why I would guess wanting better rates from turning bits to cash.
      - masonic 8y ago
        Shoppers do not care about package theft Collectively, shoppers pay for all package theft.
        mimixco 8y ago
        That is true. But we also pay for pensions, profits, advertising, union-busting, pollution, and countless other things we may not want to pay for. Ultimately, the consumer only cares about what product he is getting and what price he has to pay. How the company juggles its losses or where they come from is of no interest to the product purchaser.

xenph 8y ago

Some of the most sophisticated crime labs in the US are owned by large retail entities. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/04/csi-walmart/521565/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/04/csi-w...

tracker1 8y ago

Easy.. package theft alone probably costs Amazon millions every year. If more customers have a doorbell camera that captures motion activity, more thieves can be caught, and the less theft will happen. It's actually a very good pairing.

mimixco 8y ago
That's a facile answer and doesn't explain why so many other big tech companies are signing up for the survelliance economy. Package theft is a drop in the bucket for Amazon and can't amount to more than the equivalent losses from shoplifting if they ran retail stores.
- CryptoPunk 8y ago
  Package theft affects their margins. They will have a strong financial motive to minimize it. No conspiracy theory required. It's also a moral outrage, when a subset of the population blatantly preys on others, and perpetrating the vast majority of thefts while constituting a tiny proportion of the population. There needs to be a strong response to these types of people for the safety of everyone else.
- tracker1 8y ago
  I was only answering for the Amazon case... the rest comes down to two things, in terms of home security, it's mostly driven by the consumer demand. As to general surveillance at larger levels part of it is maximizing the fractions of a penny. I mean, if you can sell a piece of data for a fraction of a cent, but have 50 billion fractions to sell, that's a pretty big hunk of change. There are also those genuinely concerned over $STATE$ security and working towards that as a goal. I'm not condoning or supporting or rejecting for that matter any of the above. But it really doesn't take too much to see several reasons why this stuff happens. As to the losses in relation to retail stores... retail stores generally have higher margins, and they still hire security staff and put up cameras.