#home-surveillance

#home-surveillance

It is no different than finding a dog in your backyard, looking at the collar and deciding whether or not to call the number. The feature at the center of the controversy is fairly mundane on the surface - a dog goes missing; Ring alerts nearby camera owners to ask whether the animal shows up in their footage; users can respond or ignore the request entirely and stay invisible to everyone involved.

The next morning, I checked the critter-cams and saw the bear again, now captured by a camera I'd placed by a little mesh-covered opening near the small basement under my house. I watched as a massive shape emerged from the hole. My brain refused to believe it. The bear looked too large to fit in that tiny gap. I watched it again, shocked. My hands started to sweat.

"R unpacking items from a box," read one notification from the Nest camera on a shelf in the kitchen. "Jenni cuts a pie / B walks into the kitchen, washes dishes in the sink / Jenni gets a drink from the refrigerator," it continued. Sometimes, the alerts sounded like the start of a joke, "A dog, a person, and two cats walk into the room / Two chickens walk across the patio."