[cpcb]

I just placed a pre-order for 2 of the Echo Shows mostly for this Drop In feature.

My wife and I are about to be first-time parents and for us, this is a pretty exciting product for parents compared to the other devices out there in this space.

For the "drop in" feature specifically, my plan is to leave one Show in the nursery and one for my parents. They like to call us a lot, and with this device, I should be able to whitelist their device and let them "drop in" on the nursery and whatever we're doing at the time. I think a lot of people have a problem with the privacy aspect, but for us, I don't see why we would have a problem with my parents seeing the nursery at any given time, esp with the 10sec window to decline. And then once the baby is older, we'd move the Show to the kitchen for music, looking up recipes, etc.

I think there's going to be a lot of parents looking hard at this device. The intro video Amazon made is mostly for this use case as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQqxCeHhmeU

[dragonwriter]

> I think a lot of people have a problem with the privacy aspect, but for us, I don't see why we would have a problem with my parents seeing the nursery at any given time, esp with the 10sec window to decline.

As someone who is 16 months into being a first-year parent, I'm going to say that if you are about to be first time parents, you are about to discover the answer to a whole lot of "I don't see see why" questions, and "why we wouldn't want to have to actively refuse rather than actively allow anyone, even our parents, to see what is going on in the nursery at will" is pretty likely to feature prominently on that list.

[ionwake]

am I the only guy in this thread worried about hackers and what they would do with such a trove of data? I simply would be more comfortable considering this product if I had a good report detailing how secure the system is first.

[colemannugent]

You're not alone. I am very surprised that people on HN of all places are so accepting of this when they are the first to tear others apart for their lack of security.

A detailed technical guide to the security features of this device would almost be enough for me to buy one if their methodology was good and their security sound.

[ionwake]

I don't understand how an advert for a product like this does not have atleast 30 seconds dedicated to showcasing its security. Is it simply that no big data breach has ever occurred? So no one is concerned? Am I being too concerned? Is it just a matter of time before security and privacy is the priority ? Or will it never be a priority - even if a breach occurs?

[colemannugent]

It's not a priority until it affects customers enough to seriously harm their bottom line.

Even if it cost them 10% in sales they are still saving money since having solid security would cost way more and take more of the little time they have to bring the product to market.

[manyxcxi]

Just a thought, is it because it's Amazon? For me, if it was D-Link, Netgear, or most other brands, I'd immediately pass. Just absolutely no trust that they'd get it anywhere near right. If it's Google, I may pass because they already have so much of my data, and I'm just generally kind of creeped out by them a little bit more every day. If it's from Apple or Amazon I'm not assuming it's bulletproof, but I'm thinking it's going to be more secure than the vast majority of their competition, and likely as secure as anything else available.

Aside: I also realize that Apple or Amazon may pillage my data just the same, but I feel like they make money by actually selling things vs. selling my personal info and thus their incentives are skewed towards chasing things I'm generally more okay with.

[FullMtlAlcoholc]

> If it's Google, I may pass because they already have so much of my data, and I'm just generally kind of creeped out by them a little bit more every day. If it's from Apple or Amazon I'm not assuming it's bulletproof, but I'm thinking it's going to be more secure than the vast majority of their competition, and likely as secure as anything else available.

Curious why you differentiate between Amazon and Google. Maybe you pesonally don't shop there, but they are the world's largest (maybe Ali in China is bigger by volume) online retailer and they have a metric shit ton of what advertisers really want, the data on shopping preferences.

[orisa2]

For me, I don't care if Amazon has my shopping preferences. I don't see a list of every item I've ever bought or viewed as particularly sensitive information. If you use Chrome, Google search, Gmail, and maybe have an Android phone, then Google knows everything. Private conversations, every service you have ever used (assuming email is used for login), every thing you've ever searched for, every url you've ever viewed in your browser, basically everything of everything.

[wapz]

First, congrats on your soon-to-be-child. To chime in as a parent, I never have needed this feature to date. The only times our son was alone in a room was when he was sleeping and we were close enough to hear if he woke up. I'm sure YMMV so hopefully you have a good use for it but we were definitely too protective to leave him somewhere that we'd want to "drop in." As for my parents, they can message me anytime to get video chat if they want. I can't imagine them wanting to watch my child without me there but who knows.

In terms of using it when your child is older, I'm not sure you'll be using the same device 3+ years from now.