Several recent threads on home invasions and answering the door have included discussions of doorbell cameras and home security cameras. The idea of this thread is to provide a place to discuss questions, experiences, recommendations, and link to usable reviews of different brands and models. Below I will explain why I bought the brand I did last year.
While my professional field is cyber security, I am not expert on the current state of the market on security, hackability, and privacy of camera systems. We will need to find solid reviews for those topics. That said, in general my security community has some basic concerns about security and privacy on all internet-connected camera systems. Those concerns deal with basic security, access control (e.g. password management), and in particular privacy, given the questionable practices of both Amazon and Google on tracking data about their customers. If you are looking at products from either of those companies (there are several brands) be sure to learn about their privacy and file storage options. Also, check if they have external monitor agreements; for instance Ring offers a monitor service for installed Ring cameras to local law enforcement. Find out if you can opt out of that contract, and how to do so, should that concern you.
My biggest advice - do not choose based on price alone, or on the amount of advertising you see. Also, most folks who tell you , "I got Brand A; you should, too," have not done the comparison and evaluation I am recommending. Understand what your getting, in terms of both usability and features.
Side note: full time CCTV business security systems cost at least ten times more than home systems. They need a totally separate evaluation discussion.
What I bought: After reviewing the market and issues such as shaky privacy with Google products, I bought a 2 camera system from Arlo, an established but lesser advertised company. They are more expensive than Nest, Ring, etc., but offer a couple of features I like. Primary reason is that the Arlo system can include a home hub for management, to which you can add a hard drive or thumb drive for local storage of all recordings. Arlo, like Ring, Next, and others, does offer a subscription-based cloud storage service. However, with a hard drive on my hub, I can cancel that service and still have all my videos available. My neighbor is not buying the cloud storage, using only his hub. with storage I am paying the monthly fee to get artificial intelligence features like recognition of people, vehicles, animals, and packages. My local hub also captures more video segments than the cloud, a nice feature for more complete record of an incident.
I have not researched other products such as SimpliSafe and the new no-contract ADT camera service. Others might have useful information on those options.
While my professional field is cyber security, I am not expert on the current state of the market on security, hackability, and privacy of camera systems. We will need to find solid reviews for those topics. That said, in general my security community has some basic concerns about security and privacy on all internet-connected camera systems. Those concerns deal with basic security, access control (e.g. password management), and in particular privacy, given the questionable practices of both Amazon and Google on tracking data about their customers. If you are looking at products from either of those companies (there are several brands) be sure to learn about their privacy and file storage options. Also, check if they have external monitor agreements; for instance Ring offers a monitor service for installed Ring cameras to local law enforcement. Find out if you can opt out of that contract, and how to do so, should that concern you.
My biggest advice - do not choose based on price alone, or on the amount of advertising you see. Also, most folks who tell you , "I got Brand A; you should, too," have not done the comparison and evaluation I am recommending. Understand what your getting, in terms of both usability and features.
Side note: full time CCTV business security systems cost at least ten times more than home systems. They need a totally separate evaluation discussion.
What I bought: After reviewing the market and issues such as shaky privacy with Google products, I bought a 2 camera system from Arlo, an established but lesser advertised company. They are more expensive than Nest, Ring, etc., but offer a couple of features I like. Primary reason is that the Arlo system can include a home hub for management, to which you can add a hard drive or thumb drive for local storage of all recordings. Arlo, like Ring, Next, and others, does offer a subscription-based cloud storage service. However, with a hard drive on my hub, I can cancel that service and still have all my videos available. My neighbor is not buying the cloud storage, using only his hub. with storage I am paying the monthly fee to get artificial intelligence features like recognition of people, vehicles, animals, and packages. My local hub also captures more video segments than the cloud, a nice feature for more complete record of an incident.
I have not researched other products such as SimpliSafe and the new no-contract ADT camera service. Others might have useful information on those options.
