I frequently recommend video doorbells as an excellent starting point for home security, so I also keep an eye on potential problems. Earlier this year, I covered a lawsuit over Ring’s smart doorbell privacy practices. Now, two additional lawsuits seeking class-action status have been filed against Google Nest. Together, the lawsuits encompass a large portion of the video doorbells used in the US. But they focus on a specific, newer feature not all video doorbells offer: AI face recognition technology. The suits raise questions about whether these doorbells are snapping photos of strangers walking by — and what companies are doing with that biometric data. Read more: Ring Spotlight Cam 2026 Review Here are the details and, if you’re worried, why you don’t need to ditch your video doorbell in response. What are these lawsuits claiming video doorbells do? The three lawsuits — Sigwalt v. Amazon (PDF), Fennessy v. Google (PDF) and Trevino v. Google (PDF) — all make the claim that these security companies are using AI face recognition technology in ways that violate privacy rights. Slightly older lawsuits, including Ortega v. Amazon, are also ongoing. Specifically, this “familiar-face” tech can grab and analyze face photos from people who haven’t consented, including delivery workers, neighbors walking their dogs, strangers on the street and anyone else the doorbell camera may take a photo of. Security cameras have been automatically taking and storing videos of people for many years, but the lawsuits argue these familiar-face technologies create biometric “faceprints” that are collected without people’s consent and could be used to identify them against their will. I’ll discuss this more below, but both Ring and Google have previously acknowledged that their video doorbell facial recognition technology can violate certain laws — or at least become so legally complicated that it isn’t worth