Amazon-owned home security company Ring pulls through 911 call data to help create its news alerts, documents obtained by Gizmodo show.
Motherboard reported earlier this week that Ring has partnered with over 200 US police forces after obtaining notes from a police officer through a public record request.
The documents obtained by Gizmodo show that, through these partnerships, Ring requests access to local computer-aided dispatch (CAD) feeds. In other words, it has immediate access to 911 call data. The data is then used to create push-alerts on Ring's customer app, Neighbors.
Ring confirmed it uses CAD data when contacted by Gizmodo. "In an effort to provide relevant and reliable crime and safety information to our neighbors, one important source we rely on is CAD," a spokesperson said.
In an email, Ring said it receives location data including precise addresses from CAD, but no other forms of personal information. The obtained documents showed Ring also requires that police provide the time of the incident along with a category and description of the alleged crime.
One document given to law enforcement officials provides extra detail, according to Gizmodo. Ring only sends out alerts for eight specific kinds of incident: Burglary, vehicle break-in and theft, robbery, shots fired, shootings, stabbings, hostage situations, and arson. A Ring spokesperson told Gizmodo it also issues alerts for fires and explosions.
"Our in-house news team monitors every alert that comes through our system and determines if they are relevant crime & safety incidents to send out to impacted neighborhoods," the document says.
"We're proud of our partnerships with law enforcement agencies across the country, but have also taken care to design these partnerships in a way that keeps our users in control," a Ring spokeswoman told Business Insider.
