Gerrard Kaonga
Ring doorbell customers may be having mixed feelings after a privacy settlement will see them receive a payout.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has gone to bat for Ring doorbell customers after raising concerns regarding the company's privacy.
In 2023, the FTC accused the Amazon owned company of allowing employees and contractors access to users private videos.
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In a statement released this month, the government agency explained that they had sued the home security camera company and Ring customers could expect a payout as a result.
The statement read: “The FTC is sending PayPal payments totaling more than $5.6 million to 117,044 people who had an account with Ring.
“The FTC sued Ring for failing to protect customer accounts. The FTC says that Ring’s failures let employees have too much access to customer videos and made accounts vulnerable to online attacks. In some cases, hackers took control of customer accounts, cameras, and videos.
"The settlement required Ring to pay money, delete videos it shouldn’t have, and establish a strong privacy and security program. The FTC is now using that money to provide refunds to eligible Ring customers."
Full details of the payout can be found on the FTC website.
So, great you get a payout but that also means that there were privacy issues which the FTC felt was worthy of a lawsuit, so not exactly the happiest of endings.
However, just because you have a Ring doorbell doesn’t mean you get a piece of the 5.6 million payout.
It affects only those who had certain types of devices, including indoor cameras, during the timeframes regulators allege unauthorized access took place.
If that doesn’t end up being you, don't be too disappointed as despite the million-dollar figure, due to the number of customers that could have been effected, customers will only $47 each.
Not exactly a retirement payout but I suppose it is something.
Ring sent a statement the Associated Press regarding the settlement and explained what they believe had happened.
They said that bad actors took emails and passwords that were 'stolen from other companies to unlawfully log into Ring accounts of certain customers', who used the same credentials on multiple sites back in 2019.
The company added that they did promptly address this by notifying those it discovered to be 'exposed in a third-party, non-Ring incident'. They also stated they had taken actions to protect those impacted accounts.