June 4, 2026 Amazon is facing a new class action lawsuit that alleges its Ring doorbell cameras collect and store facial recognition information from people who never agreed to be scanned. The lawsuit specifically targets Ring’s Familiar Faces feature, which allows users to identify regular visitors through AI-powered facial recognition technology.
The proposed class action was filed Monday in Seattle by Virginia resident Charles Sigwalt, who claims the feature violates privacy rights by capturing facial recognition information from individuals who simply pass by Ring-equipped homes.
According to the complaint, the issue extends far beyond Ring customers themselves. “Millions of other Americans passed by a Ring security camera and unknowingly had their facial recognition information collected,” the lawsuit alleges.
The case centers on Ring’s Familiar Faces feature, which Amazon announced in September before officially launching it in December. The feature is designed to make Ring notifications more personalized. Rather than simply alerting homeowners that a person is at their door, Familiar Faces can recognize individuals who regularly visit a property and identify them by name.
For example, instead of receiving a notification that says “A person is at the door,” users might receive an alert stating “Dad is at the door.”
The system relies on AI-powered facial recognition to distinguish between visitors and identify recurring faces. Ring users must actively opt into the feature before it can be used. However, privacy advocates have argued since its announcement that people whose faces are captured by Ring cameras are never given the opportunity to consent to those scans. That concern is now at the heart of the lawsuit.
Organizations including the Electronic Frontier Foundation publicly criticized the feature, warning that facial recognition systems can create privacy risks for individuals who are unaware they are being analyzed. The feature also attracted criticism from Ed Markey, who expressed concerns about the implications of deploying facial recognition technology through consumer security devices. Despite the criticism, Amazon proceeded with the rollout.
At the time of launch, the company defended the feature by emphasizing how facial data is handled. Amazon stated that facial recognition information is encrypted and not shared with third parties. The company also said that unidentified faces are automatically deleted after 30 days.
The legal challenge arrives against the backdrop of Ring’s long-running privacy controversies. Over the years, the company has repeatedly faced scrutiny regarding how customer data and video footage are collected, stored, and accessed. One of the most significant incidents occurred in 2023 when Amazon agreed to settle allegations brought by the Federal Trade Commission. As part of that settlement, Amazon paid $5.8 million over allegations that Ring employees and contractors improperly accessed customers’ private video footage.
According to the FTC’s complaint, company employees had broad access to customer videos regardless of whether they had a legitimate business reason to view the recordings.
The agency alleged that every employee effectively had access to all customer footage, creating significant privacy concerns.
