Amazon’s new Alexa+ feature adds conversational AI to Ring doorbells

Amazon is adding a new feature to Alexa+ that adds conversational AI to Ring doorbells, allowing users to manage deliveries, reject sales staff, and allow family or friends to leave a message when they’re not around.

This feature, called Greeting, helps Ring identify who’s visiting your home based on how they dress, act, and what they’re carrying, and respond accordingly. For example, if the system sees someone in a delivery uniform delivering a package, it will respond based on your instructions.

The feature adds settings that let you specify where delivery people can leave packages and direct them toward water or snacks you may have kept. If the delivery person needs a signature, Alexa can also ask them when they might be back, and pass that message on to the user.

He or she may also deal with sales representatives or service vendors. You can set instructions like, “If someone comes to the door trying to sell you something, politely tell them we’re not interested.”

And if you’re busy or out, Alexa can greet friends or family when they visit, and ask them to leave you a message.

It goes without saying that the technology presents the risk of misidentifying people and responding inappropriately – for example, if a friend works in logistics and comes to see you after work in their delivery uniform, Ring, via Alexa, might ask them to leave the package somewhere instead of letting them leave a message.

The new feature follows Ring’s controversial facial recognition feature called “Familiar faces” Allows you to create a catalog of faces of up to 50 people who visit you regularly. Once you’ve rated those people, they’ll be named in your Ring app timeline and notifications when they visit.

Amazon says Greetings uses Ring’s video descriptions to identify the main subject on camera to generate responses, and does not identify the person.

This feature is compatible with Ring Wired Doorbell Pro (3rd generation) and Ring Wired Doorbell Plus (2nd generation) and is available to users on a Ring Premium plan who have video descriptions enabled. It’s rolling out to Alexa+ Early Access customers in the US and Canada.