After seeing a friend’s Dropcam, an easy to use surveillance camera that can store up to a month’s worth of video in the cloud, I decided to try one out. I consider it a good addition to the SimpliSafe burglar alarm system that I’ve recently installed, an upgrade from my original pair of webcams that have successfully solved two burglaries at our home in the past several years.

It wasn’t until I placed the order that I started noticing the articles pointing out how creepy it is that Dropcam’s huge data centers capturing video feeds of the lives of thousands–eventually millions–of customers are part of Google’s growing universe of Big Data. The search giant’s Nest Labs subsidiary paid $555 million to purchase Dropcam earlier this year.

Fromn re/code:

How do you convince regular people to buy Google-owned monitoring gadgets and install them in their homes?

First, don’t mention Google in your nationally televised ads.

Next, make those ads pretty funny.

That’s the strategy Google’s Nest is taking in TV ads — its first campaign — that started running today for its connected thermostat, its connected smoke alarm and its Dropcam monitors.

I’m on the fence about the need for any of these things in my home, but I do appreciate the tack Nest is taking here: Yes, it’s at least a tiny bit weird to put these things into your home. But they’re also cool. And you’re cool, for getting why they’re weird and cool.

When Google’s purchase of Dropcam was first announced, a Forbes column called it “a Privacy Nightmare.”

Another has said it appears to be part of a global spy scheme, according to Investors.com.

A prominent Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) critic says the company’s acquisition of webcam maker Dropcam is part of a nefarious plot by the search giant to expand its spying on consumers from online into the physical world.
In a blog post late Tuesday, Scott Cleland, president of research consulting firm Precursor, said Google’s $555 million purchase of Dropcam “fits into Google’s plans for a new ubiquitous physical surveillance network that will complement and leverage its existing virtual surveillance network.”

Wired asked, “Should We Trust Google With Our Smart Homes?”

The threat is two-fold. First, because it controls such an enormous amount of data about the world’s people, Google becomes a “honey pot” for the NSA and other entities that can go beyond retrieving information via subpoena and National Security Letter and actually hack into Google’s systems, as recent revelations from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden have shown. And second, you can never be sure how Google will use your personal data. As Meiri points out, Google has already said, in a letter to SEC, that it plans on delivering ads to thermostats and other connected devices.

“Say goodbye to privacy forever,” says another critic writing in pandodaily.

Google might be taking our Surveillance Valley nickname too seriously. The Information reports that the company has expressed interest in acquiring Dropcam, the home security startup that offers an Internet-connected surveillance camera, through the Nest division it acquired for $3.2 billion in January. If that acquisition happens, Google will have traded its metaphorical all-seeing eye for something a bit more literal — and maybe a little terrifying.

I shouldn’t have to explain why budding interest in security cameras from a company whose entire business model revolves around the systematic degradation of individual privacy is a bad thing, but I’ll give it a shot anyway. Google’s future depends on new and exciting ways to get advertisements in front of consumers. Serving those advertisements requires the collection of increasing amounts of information, which creates a never-ending cycle of data vacuuming.

So I’m reading all of these dire prognostications, while testing out the Dropcam and finding that it works like a charm, just as promised. It watches and listens to everything going on in a large part of our house, alerts me of unusual activity wherever I happen to be, and stores the video & audio for future reference.

Should I be enthusiastic? Or scared? I’m not sure.