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This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Akron chapter.

Amazon Prime members will soon be able to allow strangers into their houses when they’re not home! Sounds like an interesting service right? Well, the people at Amazon came up with the idea of the Amazon Key In-Home Kit which will cost $250, including a security camera for the inside of your house. This will be able to give users a live feed of who enters their houses or they can record it for later. They can also choose when to unlock the door when they’re not home.

The main point of this whole service is to stop common issues of package deliveries, such as damages from the weather and boxes getting stolen while on the porch all day.

I’m sure most people would be iffy about this new service and ultimately not want it. Even though there will be footage of the worker who does the delivery, who is to say they won’t turn their back on the company and steal items in the person’s house? If someone is busy at work and can’t watch the delivery happen live, then they’ll come home to an empty household. It’s sad that we can’t trust other people enough to follow through with their simple job of putting a box inside our doors and walking out, but these days it’s hard to trust anyone we haven’t met before. There were simpler times in America when people would leave their doors unlocked at night, but that was decades ago. Unfortunately times have changed, and we need to be safer.

Personally, I wouldn’t be okay with this service. The system is too expensive for what you get out of it. Chances are if you don’t live in a safe part of town, somewhere packages are stolen, you likely won’t be able to drop $250 on this system, let alone pay for a monthly Amazon Prime membership. If you don’t live in a good area, you’re better off buying what you need at a store or making sure someone is home the day of delivery.

Also, what if the person who delivers the package is some type of criminal who happens to stay in your house? That’s another scary aspect to think about. The only people that may buy the kit are wealthy ones who are paranoid of people stealing things off their porch, so they feel empowered to buy it. I honestly don’t see this being a huge hit overall.

Freshman at The University of Akron. Majoring in Early Childhood Education. Lover of music, clothes and dogs.