“Amazon has been quietly rolling out a new program over the past few months where delivery people will use photos to confirm your package has been delivered,” Shannon Liao reports for The Verge. “The photo of exactly where the package has been placed will be included in the notice of delivery so Amazon users know when it arrived and where it is, as first spotted by USA Today.”
“Sometimes an Amazon package can be misplaced or stolen, and Amazon’s refund policy means customers can request a duplicate of the original order,” Liao reports. “With the new Amazon Logistics Photo On Delivery program, the company would now be able to check if drivers successfully delivered the package and customers would know exactly where to find it.”
“The program is currently available in select markets, including Oregon, Las Vegas, Indianapolis, Seattle, San Francisco, and the Northern Virginia metro areas,” Liao reports. “Users who would like to maintain their privacy can opt out of having photos taken.”
https://twitter.com/Heather_PLS/status/905932416774168576
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Logistics!
Kind of cool, but maybe a bit creepy to some. What do you think? Would you like it or would you opt out?
Interns: TTK!
Prost, everybody!
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Arline M.” for the heads up.]
I think the assumption is that the delivery guy is honest. He could just as easily put the package by the door, take a picture, and then abscond with the package and if questioned he could produce the photo and say “Yes, I delivered the package. See?”
Yup… or have his partner in crime come take it afterwards..
* The assumption is also that there aren’t crooked kids or desperate addicts around who follow the postal delivery schedule and rip off packages from the front door after they’re delivered.
• The assumption is that the postal delivery person:
a) Can read package delivery instruction notes left on the mailbox.
b) Will follow the package delivery instruction notes left on the mailbox.
Examples:
– With the recent opiate addiction crisis, any addicts in the neighborhood are desperate for cash for drugs and will steal then pawn anything they can grab. Delivered packages are easy prey.
– My regular USPS delivery person puts packages at the back of the house, as instructed, just like UPS and FedEx. But on Wednesdays, lazy dumbass fills in on my delivery person’s day off. He never ever follows instructions and always puts deliveries at the front door, despite the clear message there to NOT do so.
IOW: Much as I appreciate Amazon’s replacement policy, this ‘We Have A Picture’ twist is going to cause problems and noise between Amazon and customers. I’m not looking forward to it. I’d very much enjoy having delivered packages just stay there by the front door. But the will not. My only recourse is to follow delivery data like a hawk and jump on deliveries as they are delivered. If I happen to be out of town at the time or off an an appointment, that’s my tough luck. Sad times.
Usps, ups, Fedex, all notify me when the package has been delivered. And then I can check my Canary, cam focused on my doorstep and drive, which records to see the package if I want.
not needed and creepy in some ways!
As long as it’s optional, fine.
If I cared enough, an external webcam does the job and more.
I am OK with Amazon’s doing that, as long as they don’t suffer a data breach and pirates post the photos online so everyone can see how creepy the front of my house is
Your suggestion of an external webcam is superior, as it defeats a driver/accomplice conspiracy as noted above
Amazon is just setting themselves up to be a big target for hackers. Like Yahoo and Experian and countless others, do you think the end user will be notified as soon as the data breach is discovered? Right. Don’t assume your iCloud stuff is any safer by the way. It’s one thing to stream entertainment. It’s another thing to have 24/7 surveillance in /on /around your home.
Ironic how the land of the free doesn’t trust the police but thinks corporate pushed red light cameras, home surveillance, and voice assistant home spies are a good idea. The IoT is crackers.
There is something in what you say. The mass of consumers, however, and that includes me, think paranoid attention to details is too much trouble, and elect to take a risk. Risk assessment is a common, even daily activity that all of us undertake, in everything we do. Bottom line, it is more convenient to trust the assurances of corporations (and even of politicians) that we are safe on the internet than it is for us to personally educate ourselves in security and implement appropriate measures. I say this because even after massive data breaches of Experian, Target, etc., there is no evidence that people are heading off into bunkers equipped with Faraday cages and rolls of tinfoil.
Your thinking is so odd..you make no mention of the obvious invasion of privacy.
You only mention that it is odd because you know how highly I value privacy. 🤭
But you have to admit that it is a burden to circumvent the myriad attempts to spy upon us, the better to make a buck. To take only a single example, unsolicited telephone calls, I have amassed a database of phony callers to my landline and cellphone numbers, and blocked those identified as spammers by sites like 800notes.com. Caller ID spoofing is off the charts and the national Do Not Call Lists fail to work, in the same way that gun control restricts only lawful contractees. Congress continues to be inattentive and inept with respect to this and other threats to privacy, and it is obvious why. They are being bought off by lobbyists. I’m all for unfettered free enterprise, but not when it is fettered by bribery in the form of campaign contributions and threats of voter base retaliation, as in the case of gun legislation. We all deserve elected representatives that represent we the people, who we thought elected them, rather than the special interest lobbyists, who they thought elected them.
None of us in fact has any privacy, no matter what we do. The networks soak up our information and hackers easily sample it to their black hearts’ content. Congress has been dangerously useless in protecting us from predation because they work for the predators.
Botty,
The outside of the house is not private. It’s outside….
Does that include one’s bedroom window or is that not “outside” to Amazon?
The responsibility of closing your blinds is yours.
No, botty, Herself was thinking of you and your cadre of paranoiacs when she wrote that post. I can picture you in an underground bunker, sitting in a Faraday cage, surrounded by assault rifles and ammunition, eating MREs, and wearing a tinfoil hat. And you would still be incredibly terrified the the Government was coming to violate your rights. Or, perhaps, aliens…
This service helps me when I cannot find the package. My instructions say side door, but it often lands on or near the front porch, back porch, back patio, side gate, or over the fence in the back yard. They simply cannot read or cannot follow directions.
Ah yes, they are somewhat lame in that respect. Some can’t distinguish entrances from alleyways. Amazon are beginning to subcontract deliveries, using uber for example, so the driver could be anybody. A policy requiring every driver to take such a photo could protect consumers (and Amazon) against a dubious mercenary delivery workforce as well as a growing subculture of snatch-and-run thieves. Amazon is running this as a test, and will do a cost/benefit analysis before expanding the program.
I think everyone is missing the real point. Amazon will say they delivered it, show the picture and now the stolen package is on YOU.
It’s just a way for them to transfer liability.
This!
Have no idea why wall street gives Besos so much money to waste on silly ideas, just buy UPS, you are a barely profitable delivery service (p/e = 330) and think digital technology is the answer to every problem.
We have it here in TX. Doesn’t bother me. Helped my neighbor, she got the picture of it at the “front door” but it was not her front door. It was someone two streets over with the same house number. Kind of nice in that regard, but Amazon contractors aren’t the one’s we are having problems with on deliveries. It is when they go Fedex SmartPost and end up in the hands of USPS workers.. Help us all when that happens…….
Amazon should offer or sell a delivery box for their Prime customers that uses an Alexa compatible smart lock that can issue their delivery person a software key.
That’s amazing, butt does Amazon take pictures of your back door when delivering their packages?
At any rate the camera condom does sound like an interesting idea.
You have an interesting habit of embedding double and triple entendres in your posts. I once thought I was the only one who did that. I suppose great minds (or dirty minds) think alike. 😏
They can take all the pictures they want. I just with they would read the delivery instructions I took the time to add to my shipping information.
I hope they take a pic when I open the door and pick it up. I always get my packages wearing just my speedo and unshaved overweight body. 😉
I wonder what user data they’re expecting to capture. Maybe it’s related to geomarkets.
Creepy. Get away from my door!
“Now”?
They’ve been doing this in our neighborhood for nearly 5 months.
it started here in NJ, and my last delivery photo included a picture of my wife walking out of the front door with a bag of garbage from the kitchen.. probably intentional, kinda creepy.