Tag Archive for: Amazon

Amazon textbook rental service scammed for $1.5m • The Register

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A 36-year-old man from Portage, Michigan, was arrested on Thursday for allegedly renting thousands of textbooks from Amazon and selling them rather than returning them.

Andrew Birge, US Attorney for the Western District of Michigan, said Geoffrey Mark Hays Talsma has been indicted on charges of mail and wire fraud, transporting stolen property across state lines, aggravated identity theft, and lying to the FBI.

Also indicted were three alleged co-conspirators: Gregory Mark Gleesing, 43, and Lovedeep Singh Dhanoa, 25, both from Portage, Michigan, and Paul Steven Larson, 32, from Kalamazoo, Michigan

From January 2016 through March 2021, according to the indictment, Talsma rented textbooks from the Amazon Rental program in order to sell them for a profit. The indictment describes what occurred as “a sophisticated fraud scheme.”

Talsma allegedly disguised his identity by creating multiple customer accounts with different names, mailing addresses, email addresses, and phone numbers. He supposedly did so to bypass the 15 book limit Amazon placed on textbook rentals.

His alleged fraud scheme involved using Amazon gift cards to rent the textbooks and prepaid MyVanilla Visa cards with minimal credit balances to cover the buyout price charged for books not returned.

“These gift cards and MyVanilla Visa cards did not contain names or other means of identifying him as the person renting the textbooks,” the indictment says. “Geoffrey Mark Talsma made sure that the MyVanilla Visa cards did not have sufficient credit balances, or any balance at all, when the textbook rentals were past due so that Amazon could not collect the book buyout price from those cards.”

As the scheme progressed, the indictment says, Talsma “recruited individuals, including defendants Gregory Mark Gleesing, Lovedeep Singh Dhanoa, and Paul Steven Larson, and other…

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From Ring to Alexa, which Amazon security plan is right for you?

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Ring Alarm Pro Sensors 4xSource: Ring

Amazon makes an incredible range of smart home devices, from the best smart security systems to the best smart speakers, but did you know that many of these can better help protect your home? Amazon security plans include Alexa Guard Plus, Ring Protect Pro, and Virtual Security Guard, but which one is the right plan for you? We break them all down and help you pick the right one for your home.

Alexa Guard Plus

Echo Dot 2

Source: Jeramy Johnson / Android Central

Alexa Guard Plus is the least expensive of all Amazon’s security plans, and it uses the collective smarts of your connected devices to achieve a better sense of security. Amazon maintains a list of compatible devices, which includes your Echo speakers, Ring devices, and even some surprises like Alexa-powered Christmas trees and smart outlets.

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Amazon warns that Alexa Guard Plus isn’t intended to replace a proper home security system but can be used to help you feel safer in your home.

The basic Alexa Guard tier is available for all Amazon accounts for free. Alexa Guard Plus is an upgraded service that will cost you $4.99 per month or $49 per year. Amazon sometimes offers a free one-month trial for first-time subscribers, and opting to pay for the entire year upfront essentially gives you two free months of the service.

Ring Protect Plus subscribers can get Alexa Guard Plus by linking their Ring and Amazon accounts. Afterward, open the Alexa app, tap Settings, then Guard, and follow the on-screen instructions to enable Alexa Guard Plus.

You can subscribe by saying “Alexa, try Guard Plus” to any of your Echo devices. Here’s what you get when you subscribe.

A 24/7 Emergency Helpline

Any Alexa-powered speakers connected to your Amazon account can be used to call emergency dispatch personnel by just saying, “Alexa, call for help.” It’s similar to calling 911 on your phone, but with the massive added advantage of not having to find your phone first.

Emergency sound alerts

Alexa-powered devices with microphones, such as an Echo Dot or Echo Show, can be activated while you’re away from home to listen for sounds of activity. The free Alexa Guard tier can detect the…

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Amazon Big Screen Smart Speaker | Mobile Robot

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The Show 15 can also function as a 1080p TV for the kitchen with support for Hulu, Netflix, Prime Video, and later this year, Sling TV. And when it’s not in use, the laptop-sized screen can blend into the background as a smart picture frame, displaying family photos or other pre-selected art. The device will be available later this fall, the company says.

Alexa, the company’s voice-controlled digital assistant, is getting a variety of new skills that seem designed to dovetail with the Show 15.

For example, the digital assistant can now use a smart speaker’s camera to identify members of a household and allow them to see their individual calendars, messages, or even recently played music.

And, you can now set up alerts linked to sounds in your home; for example, a notification that lets you know the smart speaker has heard the beep your fridge makes when it’s left open.

The company also announced a potentially important privacy change for its higher-end devices.

Instead of sending all voice recordings to Amazon’s cloud servers for processing, the company’s more expensive smart speaker models will process some verbal commands—such as “turn on the lights”—locally on the device.

The option will be available on the Echo Show 10, Echo Show 15, and the fourth generation Echo, but not on less expensive devices, like the entry-level Echo Dot, which have more limited processing capabilities.

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Amazon announces Astro, its first home robot

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“Alexa, ask Astro to come in here.”

I’m sitting on a couch in a simulated living room at Amazon’s Lab126 product R&D lab in Sunnyvale, California. Amazon VP of products Charlie Tritschler, who has been describing the company’s new home robot to me, is summoning the bot from another room, where it’s been biding its time before making an appearance.

The squat, gleaming white bot rolls through the door and into the area where Tritschler, principal product manager Anthony Robson, and I have been discussing it. After negotiating a carpet, it whirs in my direction. But it eventually uses facial recognition to spot Tritschler, who’s in a nearby armchair, and wheels up to him.

Code-named “Vesta,” Astro has been in the works for four years—and has been the subject of rumor and speculation for almost as long. The robot has been described as “Alexa on wheels,” which is accurate as far as it goes: It uses Amazon’s voice assistant for control and packs features—from video calls to music playback—available on other Alexa-powered devices. With its ability to monitor homes for intruders and other risks to safety, Astro is also an extension of Amazon’s security ecosystem, most of which otherwise involves products sold under its Ring brand.

But this product’s implications go far beyond those of a new Echo Show smart screen or Ring video doorbell. Rosie, the Jetsons’s robotic maid, has been a symbol of life in the future for almost 60 years; attempts to market household robots go back at least to the 1980s. Yet aside from iRobot’s Roomba and other floor-cleaning bots, useful home robots feel no closer to reality than flying cars and personal jetpacks. With Astro, Amazon aims to change that.

However, the company isn’t claiming that its robot is ready for the masses just yet. Astro will debut as a Day 1 Edition, part of an invitation-only program that will allow a select group of people to buy it for $1,000, marked down from the official price of $1,500. You can request an invite starting today, and Amazon plans to begin accepting participants and shipping Astros later this year. Early adopters will help shape the product’s future: “Our goal is to get feedback…

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