Amazon’s Ring has announced a flying indoor surveillance camera that allows users to autonomously check their homes.
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AmazonRing is delving deeper into surveillance with indoor drones for home surveillance and autonomous robots designed for corporate patrols.
The company announced Tuesday the $250 Ring Drone Cam. This is a security camera that can fly from room to room, including on the second floor, and capture footage during the day or at night. When alarms and sensors on windows, doors, and home security equipment are triggered, a textbook-sized drone flies along a preset path to investigate suspicious activity. The company says users can deploy the drone at any time.
At a demonstration in New York on Monday, Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff said the drone could be used as a home surveillance tool and as a “deterrent” against crime thanks to the device’s built-in LED lights.
“Imagine if someone is walking around your house at night and your Ring doorbell motion detector goes off, you see a spotlight and something flying across your window,” Siminoff says. “You probably won’t go into that house.”
The drone can fly for up to eight minutes at a time before returning to its charging dock autonomously, and has two plastic-covered propellers that make a loud noise while in flight.
Ring devices give Amazon another way to expand its presence in smart homes beyond its Echo smart speakers and Eero routers, expanding in a market that Grand View Research estimates will generate more than $200 billion in sales this year. Equally fertile ground for Amazon’s rivals apple and google.
Ring, which was acquired by Amazon in 2018 and is known for its doorbells, has been plagued by privacy concerns, largely due to its partnerships with law enforcement. Earlier this year, Ring came under fresh scrutiny after a controversial Super Bowl ad promoting an AI pet-finding tool called “Search Party.” It has since halted its integration with police technology provider Flock Safety, which has also faced widespread backlash over its automated license plate readers.
Ring has repurposed Amazon’s consumer robot Astro, first announced in 2021, as a business security device.
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Ring first previewed the drone, then called Always Home Cam, in 2020. Siminoff said Amazon decided to postpone the device’s launch until it finalizes the design, sensors and data processing.
The company also debuted the $1,000 Ring Rover Cam on Tuesday. The device is a repurposing of Amazon’s Astro home robot, which was short-lived as a business device and has seen few upgrades since its debut in 2021, to help companies patrol offices, warehouses, and other workspaces.
Ring said it “leveraged the best parts of Astro” to develop the Ring Rover Cam, which it describes as a “purpose-built security robot.”
Similar to Astro, this device is a display mounted on a two-wheeled base with an extendable periscope camera. It also features a “built-in siren,” two-way audio, and a “light tower” that illuminates the ceiling, allowing users to track their location.
Siminoff said in an interview that drones and robots allow users to monitor multiple areas of their home or business with just one device.
“People like indoor cameras, but they don’t necessarily want to put cameras everywhere around the house,” Siminoff said.
Ring said privacy is the “default” mode for both the drone and the robot, with LED lights flashing while recording.
Siminoff said drones cannot be flown outdoors because Federal Aviation Administration regulations restrict the operation of drones unless they are within the pilot’s line of sight.
“We have been telling our customers not to do that because it is illegal,” Siminoff said. We also installed guardrails to prevent people from jumping outside.
The Ring Drone Cam will ship in the U.S. on January 27, pending Federal Communications Commission approval, and the Ring Rover Cam will begin shipping to users on December 16, the company said.
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