The next time one of your security cameras sees someone coming to visit your home or a package being delivered to you, Alexa will be the first to let you know.
According to Amazon, Alexa person and package detection alerts are already rolling out, and this feature will also include the ability to automatically display a live camera feed on your Echo Show, Fire TV, or Fire Tablet whenever a person or a pack.
You will also receive mobile notifications from the Alexa app.
The new feature isn’t limited to Ring doorbells and security cameras. Thanks to Amazon’s new Object Detection Sensor API, the cameras’ Alexa voice notifications can also work with other Alexa-enabled cameras, even those from Google (it’s easy to forget that there actually is a skill by Google for Alexa).
Alexa Person and Package Alerts are now available for Ring Video Doorbell (2020) and Ring Video Doorbell Pro 2, and will be coming “soon” to Adobe’s Iota and Outdoor cameras.
In the meantime, Alexa Person Alerts are available on all other Ring doorbells and cameras. Later they will also arrive for the Google Nest Cam (including the outdoor model and also the wired and battery-powered indoor models), the Nest Cam with projector and the battery-powered Nest Doorbell.
In addition to Adobe and Google, other manufacturers will be able to integrate Alexa camera alerts through the new API, i.e. as long as their cameras with Alexa are compatible with the H.264 video codec and offer at least 720p video resolution.
To benefit from Alexa person and package alerts, you may need to pay for a subscription that includes person detection.
In case of Ring, this means subscribing to Ring Protect, que tiene un precio adicional que inicia en 3 $ al mes o 30 $ al año, mientras que los planes de Abode comienzan en 7 dólares al mes en Estados Unidos (not available in Europe).
Google doesn’t charge anything for this basic people detection feature, but you’ll need a Nest Aware subscription ($5 per month) to take advantage of the company’s more advanced algorithms.
You can enable Alexa People and Package Alerts from the Alexa app. Just go touch your camera devices > camerasthen enable the person detection alert and/or package detection alert settings.
Original article published on TechHive.
