Amazon Hit With a New FTC Lawsuit That Reveals Worrisome Privacy Issues

The FTC fine against doorbell camera maker Ring seems negligible --$5.8 million -- compared to the accusations levied against the company, which is a subsidiary of Walmart. 

The Federal Trade Commission settled with Ring after accusing the company of giving employees unrestricted access to video from their customers' homes.

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"As a result of this dangerously overbroad access and lax attitude toward privacy and security, employees and third-party contractors were able to view, download, and transfer customers' sensitive video data for their own purposes," an FTC filing with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said, according to Reuters. 

Ring employees and employees who worked for a third-party contractor in Ukraine had access and could download every customer video.

As part of the settlement agreement, which is valid for 20 years, Ring is required to disclose to customers exactly how much access the company gives to employees and contractors.

One Ring employee allegedly viewed videos from at least 81 different female users at least one hour a day on hundreds of occasions, the lawsuit said, according to CNBC. 

Ring was acquired by Amazon in 2018 for $1 billion.

"Importantly, because Ring failed to implement basic measures to monitor and detect inappropriate access before February 2019, Ring has no idea how many instances of inappropriate access to customers' sensitive data actually occurred," according to the complaint.

Ring has been frequently criticized for the amount of data it collects about users. Though it is not unique in this regard (nearly all major technology companies, from Slack to Spotify to Facebook, get criticized for collecting too much data), a piece last year from Wired broke down in detail just how much information Ring has about its customers.