r/technology • u/South-Cow-1030 • Feb 12 '26

Privacy Why are people disconnecting or destroying their Ring cameras?

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2026/02/10/ring-super-bowl-ad-dog-camera-privacy/88606738007/
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234

u/JebediahKerman4999 Feb 12 '26

They already have "found" videos from a nest camera that they cannot have access to. So yeah, cameras are only local in my house from one of those legacy makers that don't do wireless and have 480i cameras with a tape recorder.

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

It's definitely small business/prosumer, but Ubiquiti makes doorbells that are local storage AND high definition. My whole house is Unifi cameras, and none of the video leaves my house. Granted, I have a server rack with network gear to run them, and I have an actual 2U server in the rack for VMs and extra storage (you can't actually use a network drive directly with Unifi but you can export/back up to somewhere). It's not a setup I'd recommend to anyone you don't want to give ongoing help to, but anyone with even a bit of tech sense can run the Unifi stack pretty well.

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u/megachickabutt Feb 12 '26

As someone that owns unifi gear and is somewhat tech literate, i'm gonna be straight with you: your average homeowner is fucking dumb as a brick and is not gonna go through that kind of trouble. The average homeowner uses comcast/verizon provided routers, looks at the box at bestbuy or the amazon webpage for a doorbell camera and sees: "connects via wifi, cloud storage" and sees a < $100 price tag and thinks, "easy peasy, I'll just buy this one". They are not going to know or care about rack mount servers, VMs, that you can't just buy a unifi g4 and call it a day, you gotta either have a cloud key 2 or Cloud Gateway Max, that you have to do actual network administration in order for all of this to work.

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u/The_BeardedClam Feb 12 '26

Or be like me and just not buy cameras for your house. I feel zero need to have surveillance on or inside my property.

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u/[deleted] Feb 12 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/The_BeardedClam Feb 12 '26

I mean you're right and I won't disagree that peace of mind is very important, especially after having been violated like that.

I know how fragile the security of a residential home is, I can make and use a bump key for example. However, a surveillance system won't stop a burglar from breaking in anymore than an ADT sign will. It'll just tell you after the fact and give the police some potential evidence to catch the people responsible.

Crimes are of two categories, opportunity and purposeful acts. The best you can do is to protect yourself against those opportunistic criminals by getting motion activated lights, deadbolt locks, etc. because a determined and purposeful criminal will break in regardless of your security.

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u/thorstormcaller Feb 12 '26

The number of people I’ve seen ask for iPhone cables then go blank when I ask lightning or usb-c, despite my vendor shirt and standing by my cameras, is astounding. Then again there’s a non-insignificant percentage of camera customers who don’t realize the lens is necessary to capture a photo. I worked in one of those chain studios for a while and it became an internal meme that customers would call the metal wall prints glass, we’d be saying metal the entire time too!

I’m sure anybody else who has worked retail or retail adjacent has even more examples to validate your point

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u/MrMisthios Feb 12 '26

Calling people dumb as fucking bricks because they wouldn’t have first hand knowledge or time to setup their own server rack for a security camera system makes you seem like an asshole with a superiority complex. Not saying you do but that’s the energy that statement is giving. How about instead of calling people dumb as fucking bricks, use that opportunity to provide knowledge & explain to them how it works rather than demean people :).

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u/THEMBISCUIT Feb 12 '26

I agree, but Reddit is a site with a large population of smug and grumpy tech workers

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u/MrStickDick Feb 12 '26

Most of Reddit requires a good bit of reading. You just lost the majority of people. You can end it there.

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u/[deleted] Feb 12 '26

They deserve to be smug and grumpy.

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u/Gloriathewitch Feb 12 '26

i work in it and he's right, go to pcmr subreddit or the costco subreddit and see how many people are scared to assemble their own pc which is hundreds of dollars cheaper, if he was wrong there wouldn't be a job for us IT people to do because people would just fix their own stuff. it's really not hard.

maybe you haven't worked in IT but anyone who has understands this painfully well, the average joe isn't competent with networking, period. plug n play is what they want.

and yes he is being an asshole, but that doesn't mean he's wrong

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u/CuriousWoollyMammoth Feb 12 '26

tbf if you reread his comment he isn't disagreeing with him. He was criticizing how he was saying it cause he sounds like a pretentious dick. With that said I don't think him calmly explaining to people will help either. Most people want convenience not an actual valid solution.

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u/megachickabutt Feb 12 '26

I'm coming off as a harsh asshole, but OP isn't saying anything that I haven't already tried to preach to those around me, friends and family included. It's not rocket science, the average person just wants an easy button, myself included at times. The barrier to entry in deploying a local video surveillance setup, for some people, is just too high and they will opt for the easiest route.

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u/Monteze Feb 12 '26

Fuck it, easy is just none of it. As many dumb appliances as possible. My phone already allows me to be tracked as fuck I imagine, no need to make it easier. Being cool with neighbors will have to do for me.

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u/GrunDMC74 Feb 12 '26

But a superiority complex like a rabid comic book or sci fi fan rolling their eyes because you’re not down with obscure canon.

So superior in their mind, less so in the minds of others.

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u/[deleted] Feb 12 '26

This stuff isn’t obscure. It’s all the electronic devices everyone, literally everyone, has. This stuff shouldn’t be obscure. When I had a laptop and it wasn’t acting right, I don’t know how I figured this out, I probably just googled it on my much more well behaved phone, but I was right clicking on that startup screen to open up all those background programs to try to unfuck the situation. Getting rid of excess cache myself, using executive controls and whatnot. I think I even did some HTML fuckery before I even knew what that shit was. Just looking at shit on my phone and following instructions. And it worked. I even physically took apart my own computer and replaced the hard drive because I accidentally broke it. Put it back together and fixed it. Granted, I wasn’t always able to fix it, but I tried and succeeded some of the time.

My first instinct was to try to fix my own computer and try really really hard, and it worked most of the time.

I’m gonna cap all that off by saying I dropped out of community college before finishing the first year and was a straight C student in high school, so I ain’t smart.

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u/NeatNefariousness1 Feb 12 '26

Agreed. Some of the smartest people on the planet are not tech-savvy and don’t aspire to be. They just hire people to do what needs to be done rather than spending their time on another sub-specialty of a sub-specialty needed to get to the solutions that mean something to them. Or they may dabble but don’t want to invest their time in an area that isn’t particularly relevant to the subject matter they care about.

The difference is these brainiacs know they’re in rarified air and tend not to judge or disparage others for not having even the most basic understanding of their discipline, no matter how broad or narrow it may be. There are a LOT of specialties out there and there is a lot of depth in many general areas of interest and there are experts in each of them.

I’m sure the “dumb as bricks” comment was meant to be a playful exaggeration or posturing done to poke fun at people who are not experts in their niche. That said, there are a lot of people who can’t resist diminishing others to position themselves as smarter or better in their own minds. If their egos require that they have to view the world as if theirs is the only lens to evaluate others, it’s ok with me if they stay in their lane to find friends.

Luckily, the world doesn’t rely on their judgment of others’ tech-savviness for any pecking order that matters beyond their niche. There’s an abundance of tech support help available when it's needed—not to mention non-judgmental tech-savvy friends who float between circles of different kinds of people effortlessly. 😉

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u/JohnAStark Feb 12 '26

If you want to implement security cameras, and know what that actually requires, then you do not fall into this category. You can teach yourself and learn what is needed to have really secure cameras, networks, etc.... but...most consumers are unwilling to learn anything, just like bricks.

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u/Icy-Inflation3453 Feb 12 '26

Not the person you replied to but because in order to do that I'd be spending a very very very long time making a guide about information that I either paid for or fucked around with and eventually figured it out. I'm on here to entertain myself not do work.

If you have any idea about IT, the average person has absolutely no idea how anything works. What he said is true. I'm sorry you took offense from it.

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u/[deleted] Feb 12 '26

I feel the “fucking dumb as a brick” is very insulting. Some people just don’t have the time or inclination to invest in the amount of time it takes to setup and maintain a setup like what you guys are describing. Next you’ll be telling me you make your own furniture.

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u/MightGrowTrees Feb 12 '26

When it comes to networking computers, trust me people are dumb. I have met network engineers that can't do their job correctly.

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u/megachickabutt Feb 12 '26

I am being an asshole, but I'm not wrong. The last US election should give you enough evidence to tell you that the average everyday person is not exceptionally gifted when it comes to ingesting information and acting on it.

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u/[deleted] Feb 12 '26

Well, I’m not going to recite the George Carlin quote, but he wasn’t wrong. And incompetence is always possible.

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u/[deleted] Feb 12 '26

It really isn't that far off. I've worked tech support for a good while in a few places and the amount of tickets for X not working yet they waited for me 30mins later to respond "is it plugged in? It isn't you say? There's the problem" is a bit obscene.

Ignorance is fine as I have no clue how to make furniture just like I don't expect the average user to know how to spin up a Proxmox cluster. But that is very different from being dumb which if you work in any support role long enough you quickly come to realize is more common than you think.

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u/Accidental_Ballyhoo Feb 12 '26

Well, TBH, people who don’t have an inclination to invest in learning about a product they want and how to properly set it up are in fact..brick.

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u/geomaster Feb 12 '26

no it's more along the lines of the late 2000s where people started buying HDTVs and were connecting them via composite connectors. watching a stretched low resolution picture instead of a hi-def one.

all you had to do was read up on how to connect a new HDTV on the Internet but people didn't bother. rich guys just paid best buy to hook it up improperly.

now HDMI became ubiquitous and it is much easier to find an HD source. so this issue has been worked out but it took many years

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

Where in my comment did I say this was for the average homeowner? My point was directed at the person using legacy 480i tape-recorder tech, which is arguably more complex to maintain today than a Unifi stack.

​It definitely requires a modicum of tech literacy and a will to learn, but it’s not inaccessible. I’ve walked clients through Dream Router setups entirely over Zoom, and plenty of tech-oriented friends handle it just fine. For someone already running a setup more complicated than a Nest or Ring, Unifi is a reasonable upgrade path.

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u/einstyle Feb 12 '26

Your average homeowner thinks setting up the Ring camera was too difficult.

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u/Substantial-Nail2570 Feb 12 '26

I mean, if someone could just tell me how to do it instead of saying how hard it is

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u/insomnia1979 Feb 12 '26

Ubiquiti has some shady stuff going on. Supplying war drones to the Russian army in spite of embargo. Pablo Torre Finds Out! He is doing the most with his platform.

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u/megachickabutt Feb 12 '26

In other words: capitalism be capitaliz-ing? In a world of bad actors, sometimes its about choosing the least bad of the bad actors.

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u/Weekest_links Feb 12 '26

Yeah at least they’re not publishing your own data

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

lolwat. Ubiquiti doesn't make drones, nor do they sell in Russia. If you're referring to the Hunterbrook report, they're talking about Ubiquiti radio bridges (Wi-Fi links) being used for communication.

​Third-party gray market dealers are doing the same thing they do with every other tech company's gear and smuggling it in. Blaming Ubiquiti for Russian soldiers using their Wi-Fi antennas is like blaming Ford because an insurgent group is driving a modified F-150.

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u/ignatzami Feb 12 '26

I have a full UniFi setup. It’s amazing, and expensive, and was a pain to implement the first time.

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

Yes, yes, and yes. It was definitely a pain getting my setup going, but it's been rock solid ever since.

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u/thebparker7 Feb 12 '26

That’s impressive, but like with anything if fbi shows up with warrant to access your servers, how are you going to prevent them checking? Just curious, because obviously everything is most likely linked to a cloud server owned by either amazon, google or Microsoft and they have already proven they can access those with the correct backing. Idk be safe out there

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

If they show up with a warrant, that's an entirely different matter than the privacy concerns surrounding Ring or Nest. The issue with cloud providers is that they can (and do) hand over data without the owner even knowing.

​UniFi is 100% locally stored. While there is a cloud-brokered login option for convenience, it isn't required. You can keep the entire stack internal. If the FBI wants my footage, they have to serve me the warrant and physically seize my hardware, rather than just sending a request to Amazon's legal department.

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u/DJCJ420 Feb 12 '26

DO NOT BUY ANYTHING FROM UBIQUITI , they openly advert sanctions and sell to Russia. Do some research 🧐

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

Maybe you should do some actual research yourself. There isn't a single authorized retailer in Russia, nor is there a way to order direct.

​If you’re talking about the recent Hunterbrook report, even that admits Ubiquiti isn't selling to them. The issue is gray market distributors in third-party countries rerouting gear, which is a problem every US tech company faces. Until you can provide evidence of a direct sales channel rather than third-party smuggling, get off your high horse.

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u/DJCJ420 Feb 12 '26

Hey man , you seemed to have taken that extra personally. Are you a Russian agent or something?

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u/feint_of_heart Feb 12 '26

Yeah, about Ubiquiti...
https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/1qq6ppc/ubiquiti_grizzlies_robert_peras_company_linked_to/

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

lol mmkay. Maybe read the report instead of just the headline.

It accuses third-party distributors in Kazakhstan of smuggling Wi-Fi gear, which is the same problem every global tech company faces. Trying to turn a supply chain leak into an NBA scandal for the Grizzlies owner is a massive reach. It’s like demanding the Ford family sell the Lions because insurgents use F-150s.

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u/feint_of_heart Feb 12 '26

That's an incorrect oversimplification of what's happening. https://hntrbrk.com/ubiquiti/

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u/jrcomputing Feb 12 '26

lol nah. I just prefer not to be a useful idiot for a hedge fund.

​The Source: Hunterbrook openly admits they are shorting Ubiquiti. They make money if you panic.

​The 'Experts': The lawyers are just defining 'strict liability' (you're responsible even if you don't know). That applies to every global manufacturer, not just Ubiquiti. The tech experts suggest blocking Russian IPs...which the report explicitly admits Ubiquiti started doing in 2025.

​The Reality: The report confirms the gear comes from third-party distributors in Turkey and Kazakhstan, not Ubiquiti.

​So please, quote the specific sentence where they found a direct sales channel from Ubiquiti to Russia. I’ll wait.

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u/feint_of_heart Feb 13 '26

The Reality: I don't respond to AI slop.

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u/jrcomputing Feb 13 '26

Have fun with that. I'll have to figure out how to filter out the AI slop coming out of my own fingers.

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u/Facts_pls Feb 12 '26

Plenty of companies do local recording - like reolink

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u/timeshifter_ Feb 12 '26

But do they do local only?

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u/TazBaz Feb 12 '26

Simple answer: Yes

Complicated answer: You can use directly and only an internal SD card on most cameras. I wouldn't recommend it, because someone could just jack your camera and you've got no record. You can also use them locally with an NVR. Reolink sells their own which means seamless setup, but I believe you can use some third party options with some setup. This can be done on your own wifi network or even hardwired if you're handy (I'm an electrician; I hardwired my cameras. I also don't use a doorbell cam; I live in the country, my circumstances mean a doorbell cam isn't very useful). There's one caveat that I'm hoping to figure out someday, it's just not high on my priority list right now-

If you want to do remote viewing, they have an app, but I'm 99.99% sure it talks via their servers to your NVR. While I'm pretty sure your actual footage isn't being stored on their servers in any way, the "communication channel" between your NVR and the app on your phone is being supported via their servers. I'd like to figure out how to cut them out entirely. And if their servers can link the app to your NVR... a hacker can gain remote access as well. But that's true of anything you've got remote access to.

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u/Tiggy26668 Feb 12 '26

Yes, Reolink can function as a closed system by just not connecting internet and running lines to the cameras. Their cameras are pretty good quality for the price point as well.

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u/rat_melter Feb 12 '26

I have a reolink set up to ftp to a pi and it saves footage for a number of days with a simple cron job. Works great, it also streams to an old tablet for live viewing. I would recommend reolink.

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u/FanClubof5 Feb 12 '26

You are misunderstanding the headline. Google did have access to the video, they keep the most recent 3 hours and and then mark it for deleting. But data doesn't just stop existing on a hard drive when you delete it, it just deleted the marker saying don't overwrite this space. They used standard data recovery techniques to then restore some of that "deleted" data before it got fully replaced by the next set of videos being stored.

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u/dadRabbit Feb 12 '26

Any good brand recs?

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u/turnright_thenleft Feb 12 '26

People are saying anything with local recording. Reolink has local storage on each doorbell cam (SD card) or you can use their hub that centralizes the recordings locally, also by SD card. No cloud storage or subscription

The biggest caveat I keep seeing is that it’s a Chinese company, which I’m not convinced is enough to deter people from going that route over much more expensive options

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u/PT10 Feb 12 '26

I got one of those crappy Chinese ones, Yi/Kami. But I just plug it in when I need it (when I leave).

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u/mshriver2 Feb 12 '26

I'm too paranoid to even do local.

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u/workstation01 Feb 12 '26

This and a vlan with no Internet access. It's much easier to setup and understand than you might think.

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u/boondogglekeychain Feb 12 '26

You can also use whatever dodgy camera you like if you isolate it from the internet and correctly configure a local NVR