Originally published at: Amazon Key: new service bathes your home in evil red glow as strangers enter it - Boing Boing
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Always have at least one more camera than they know about.
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Fuck no. And if i was a homeowner i would rather put in a locker of sorts out front and have this connected lock thing on it. That seems like a more reasonable use for it than having a stranger being able to unlock my door AND having an IoT lock on my door that could potentially be used maliciously by 3rd parties.
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Lock box is the way to go, no fuss, no muss.
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I read the headline as “…lets the curious unlock your front door.” Which is probably still accurate.
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My god, this is such a bad idea…how is anybody on board with this nonsense?
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This. Or just have parcels delivered to a secure location where you can get them on the way home, whether that’s your company mailroom or one of those parcel locker services.
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This is a foolproof plan.
We are living in such a creepy future. First they convince us to install monitoring devices that record everything we say now they want physical access to our homes.
I’m actually not so paranoid to believe this is anything other than Amazon trying to offer convenient services that customers want (and to deal with package theft) but what a scary system they’re building.
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This is not for you. This is for people who already have cleaners and gardeners and dog walkers etc. who already are going in and out of their house all the time.
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Dude. Dude. C’mon. What do you think’s gonna happen when say, the FBI wants to enter a home equipped with this device, to surreptitiously look for evidence of “terrorism”? They won’t even need a warrant to get the digital key because amazon has it.
From there, it’s a short step to interpreting the law to say that the homeowner has given tacit consent for entry to amazon, and from amazon to the authorities when they pass on that contract in specific cases.
edit: edit for spelling
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Evil red glow not detected by the colour blind. 
Colour blindness makes red objects look brown.
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“…the company is hoping that you’ll use Key when ordering stuff like dog walking or kitchen cleaning from its Amazon Home Services division. In the coming months, it says Key will be integrated with over 1,200 service providers across 60 professions. You’ll log on to the website or app of a service like Rover.com or Merry Maids, and there will be a button offering the option for in-home service through Amazon Key.”
Go buy yourself a smart lock for allot less than $250.00 and just give out codes for your dog walker, your handyman or your gardener.
Red bulb .88 cents.
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That’s fair but we should recognize that locks are garbage in general. Picking a home lock is trivial, they’re just there to keep us honest. This is not to say that I leave my doors unlocked, or that I think an IoT lock is a particularly good idea right now. There’s too much stupid going around.
The ability to authenticate and revoke “keys” without handing out physical objects is pretty compelling.
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Incandescent? Eww.
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It is, though having a connected lock means that there’s an additional vector for people to get into your house. And hacking something can be much easier and much faster than picking a lock depending on the type of vulnerability a particular lock has.
If a homeowner wanted to have a keyless lock that multiple people can use that’s fine, i think it’s a really handy concept but i would hope that consumers keep the potential downsides in mind and secure their home appropriately to minimize risk.
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Sure. You’ve never given your house keys to a dog walking service? Or how about a cleaning service? This doesn’t seem all that different to me.
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This seems less like a security feature and more like a form of entertainment for people who get off on strangers entering their home while they’re away.
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Well, at least in my opinion, just because the current implementations are poor doesn’t mean the idea is bad. A “connected” lock could actually be much more secure than the average physical lock.
