Use the New Ring Control Center to Block Police Requests
It seems like a lot of people aren’t going to give up on their expensive video doorbells no matter what Ring does – either because they paid good money for it and they’re stubborn, or they don’t want to spend even more time fiddling around. with screwdrivers and wires for installing something else.
This is fine. We all make good and bad decisions in life. But if you’re sticking with Ring devices, you should definitely check out the new Control Center that the company just debuted with its Android and iOS apps .
Once you can access it (via the hamburger icon in the upper left corner of the app), you will see several options that are all worth exploring.
I would start from the bottom up. Scroll down to the Community Control section and click on Video Requests . Set the switch to Disabled to prevent local police from requesting video from your various Ring devices through the Ring Neighbors service. (And if you would like to know which of your local police stations, if any, can request such information, click on the “View Active Agency Map” option.)
This will not stop the police from using subpoenas or warrants to retrieve your videos. This only keeps them from using Neighbors to request video recording, which can be annoying – or something you don’t want to participate in.
From there, return to the Control Center and notice the three options “Authorized Client Devices”, “General Users” and “Linked Accounts” . In each of them, you will receive an emergency switch that you can use to quickly remove any associations with your Ring account. Check out these lists if you haven’t used two-factor authentication to protect your account, just to make sure no one else has access to your records.
Finally, click on Two-Factor Authentication. You should have already used this to secure your account, although Ring has never suggested that you do this before. (This will soon pour out 2fa automatically for new accounts, but the ring is not going to force existing accounts to use 2fa.) You can use this screen to make sure you are using two-factor authentication. And if not, then you can and should configure it.
Admittedly, Ring’s implementation is actually 2-Step Verification, a less secure setup in which you send text verification codes when you log in. Someone finds it easier to access your phone number than a physical device like the authentication app on your smartphone with fingerprint lock, but 2-Step Verification is better than nothing.