Hackers Make Use Of Smart Cameras To Snoop On You

According to recent information by CBS-owned WBBM TV, Google had to report to the US press about the security issue related to hackers. Accordingly, the incident happened with Arjun Sud from Illinois, as he heard a strange male voice coming from the Nest camera installed in the room of his 7-month-old son. When the hacker realized he had been recognized by Sud, the man began to abuse and threaten him. Google has denied the Nest's infringement and claimed that those incidents occur due to poor user password selection.

Today, home users love to use smart cameras because they are designed to track their homes, children, and pets while they are working or traveling far from homes. These cameras with their own configuration can easily detect abnormal movements in the locations. Users can also get real data from anywhere via their smartphones. Yet, smart devices, including smartphones, are eventually goldmines of the hackers. 

Ritesh Chopra, country manager-consumer business unit of Symantec Co. claimed that among IoT attacks in 2018, connected smart cameras made up for 15.2%, which is three times higher than the proportion in 2017. This shows the increased instability that these cameras have brought in within just a year.

Kaspersky warned that most smart cameras provide access to data feeds through web interfaces. These interfaces contain a control panel for user management. However, the websites of each camera can easily be detected by specialized search engines like Shodan or Censys. Such security gaps could facilitate cybercriminals to track users' activities and prepare plans to break into their homes without the owners’ notices. 

Kaspersky also mentioned that as users and manufacturers set the importance of the ease of usage rather than security, therefore, smart cameras can be hacked at any time easily. They are also not well equipped with computing power and memory to ensure safety.

Ilyushin added that there seem to be too few requirements in the industry for manufacturers. On the contrary, they tend to create their own standards, which are often unrelated to security and prioritize them over security. Users can avoid security risks by regularly managing and changing passwords. The regular delay for firmware updates or system vulnerabilities can reveal your home's secrets to hackers through cameras.

The increase in the use of smart devices, especially smart cameras with underperformed security, can raise concerns about cybercrime, and cases like Sud will become more and more common. As such, in order to protect yourself and your family, users need to regularly update stronger passwords, and not to share smart devices with your home networks.