Private security footage is nothing new to criminal investigations, but two factors are rapidly changing the landscape: huge growth in the number of devices with cameras, and the fact that footage usually lands in a cloud server, rather than on a tape.
When a third party maintains the footage on the cloud, it gives police the ability to seek the images directly from the storage company, rather than from the resident or business owner who controls the recording device. In 2022, the Ring security company, owned by Amazon, admitted that it had provided audio and video from customer doorbells to police without user consent at least 11 times. The company cited “exigent circumstances.”
Someone set off a bomb close to my house. Police asked me questions about it (time, what it sounded like, etc). They noticed I had security cameras and inquired what I had. The dumbfounded look when I said Ubiquiti (they’ve never heard of it) and that all footage was recorded locally on a hard drive. Like they didn’t understand what that meant - obviously they were looking for an answer such as “google” or “amazon” so they could just circumvent me.
I have their routers and stuff! It’s way overkill but I was having such major issues with the all in one routers one usually gets.