MIT Technology Review Subscribe

Prepare for People to Leave Packages Inside Your Home When You’re Not There

Privacy advocates, look away now. CBNC reports that Amazon is developing ways to leave parcels inside your home or car trunk while you aren’t around.

According to the report, the e-tailer is working on some kind of smart doorbell and lock system that could give delivery drivers one-time access to your home. It’s also said to be in talks a with a startup called Phrame, which is building hardware to securely store a key outside your vehicle so that authorized people can get into it.

Advertisement

As we’ve explained in the past, it’s no secret that Amazon wants to streamline shipping. This idea goes a step further than improving the logistics of getting packages to your door, though, and instead deals with the problem of your not being there to take delivery (an issue that only gets bigger the more things we buy online).

This story is only available to subscribers.

Don’t settle for half the story.
Get paywall-free access to technology news for the here and now.

Subscribe now Already a subscriber? Sign in
You’ve read all your free stories.

MIT Technology Review provides an intelligent and independent filter for the flood of information about technology.

Subscribe now Already a subscriber? Sign in

Clearly, the move could help solve some of the problems of unattended parcels left (and, ahem, “lost”) outside homes, as well as sparing neighbors from taking in your stray boxes until you make it home. But even if it’s convenient, it’s unclear whether customers trust Amazon—and, more important, its delivery staff—enough to use such a service.

This is your last free story.
Sign in Subscribe now

Your daily newsletter about what’s up in emerging technology from MIT Technology Review.

Please, enter a valid email.
Privacy Policy
Submitting...
There was an error submitting the request.
Thanks for signing up!

Our most popular stories

Advertisement