Ring doorbell, owned by Amazon, is making changes to its video sharing policy concerning sharing images with law enforcement.  

Law enforcement has always been able to access Ring videos from homeowners, with their consent.  

This includes capturing videos of individuals committing crimes or walking within camera range.  That is until now.

We, law enforcement, will now have to obtain search warrants to acquire your videos from cameras attached to your property, from the devices you paid for.  

We just wanted to share this troubling policy that Ring has enacted.  

When you purchase the Ring camera you consent to Ring’s policies.

What does this mean for you?  

If you own a Ring camera and have a robbery, breaking and entering, or any other crime we can no longer obtain videos from Ring without a search warrant.  

Nor can you — if the intent is to supply us with the video evidence — release those videos to us.  We will now have to obtain a search warrant and serve Ring.  

This process will most certainly delay getting evidentiary images.  

It will most certainly delay us solving crimes.  It most certainly will limit our chances of developing suspect information in a timely manner.

To our knowledge this only affects the Ring camera owned by Amazon.  

Ring did not give a reason for this change, but did publish that it takes effect immediately.

We have solved numerous crimes with the images you have given us from the devices attached to your property and from the devices you paid for.  

We are disappointed at this decision.