‘sup?
Thatsmyname writes:
I came across a story about a Russian surveillance website, that broadcasts unsecured webcams online. After checking it out, I found there are almost 60 feeds for Ireland, including one sitting just above a baby’s cot, from somewhere near Kells [Co Meath]. It may not be exactly precise, but it pinpoints on a map where this camera is located. I find this really creepy and disturbing. As a mother, I know I certainly wouldn’t want my kids and privacy violated like this. This is wrong. You may not want to publish the link [below], but you can see for yourself. The website link is a screen grab of what was broadcast when I checked it out. Someone in Kells needs to know that their child is being broadcast online!
Anyone?
Previously: Everything To See Here
UPDATE:
The front page, and two-page spread of an investigation into the matter by Ben Haugh in the Irish Mail on Sunday on Sunday, September 21, 2014.
Thanks IMOS
Lads maybe linking to the camera feed isn’t the best idea.
Feckin eejits.
How else are people to check if their camera is online?
Link to the website sure but this is a link straight to the feed of somebody’s baby, not the website’s home page.
Also – google.
Don’t think link to exact feed or website matter.
Anyone going to the site will look at the irish ones to see if they are on there.
Also, what are these cams on the internet for?
Surely you dont need your baby cam online?
Video baby monitor from mothercare – four hundred euro.
Cheap wifi webcam with more camera resolution and sound – forty to eighty euro, depending on model and where you buy it.
Problem is that most of these cameras have public feeds enabled by default. They can usually be disabled and then the cameras are a perfectly safe and cheap option for baby monitors.
It definitely does matter. It’s unethical and almost certainly against Children First guidelines which tbf isn’t something BS usually have to deal with I’d say.
Aren’t the Children First guidelines about child abuse and neglect? In other words, they only kick in if you saw the parents on that feed abusing the child.
You’re probably thinking of something else, like, say, common sense, decency, that kind of thing.
You can just google and you’ll find that address.
People need to be aware that they need to change the username and password on these IP cameras they’re buying. That website simply scans for broadcasting cameras and tries the default username and password.
If you know someone with an IP camera, tell them to change their security settings.
Uh, how do you do that, Jonjo? Change the security settings? Nice of you to suggest that people tell their friends to do things, but easy instructions would be even nicer.
dont use equipment if you cant be bothered to read the manual bro
+1
It’s just lazy-tech-parenting, no sympathy for any parent that gets freaked by this. And rectifying it would take a couple of minutes.
If anything, fair play to the website for highlighting peoples foolishness! Maybe now they’ll do it right.
‘change the username and password’. That shouldn’t be too difficult to figure out.
People shouldn’t buy technology they don’t understand.
Are you kidding? Half the country wouldn’t buy kiwi fruit in that case.
The problem is that these IP cams are generally all Chinese made, and then sold in Ireland without any real attempt at producing English instructions, or decent software to accompany them. I’ve bought a couple in the past and they were an awful pain in the ass to setup precisely because of this.
Don’t buy the crap ones then.
Easy to say, but they’ve *all* been crap, in fact they’ve pretty much all been the same Chinese model that was rebranded a few dozen times. It wasn’t until Dropcam came on the scene that decent, affordable IP cams with properly designed UIs were available.
“As a mother”… listen, no sane person wants (pseudo) anonymous video of children being streamed to the wide web of salivating paedos. Your being a mother has nothing to do with it. I’d say you start a good 20% of your sentences with “As a mother…”
As a mother, I can leave the Range Rover on the double yellows while I run into SBUX for a mochamatcha and some coffee-angels for the kids…
Blathnaid Ni Chofaigh used to be a divil for that on The Afternoon Show.
Blathnaid Ni Chofaigh can run ! ?
“As a big brother….”
as a 1980’s New York style breakdance instructor…
*adjusts sweatbands*
+ one headspin
I put that point in there, because I put myself in the shoes of the parents who don’t know that their child is freely being broadcast on the internet without their knowledge. I would be feckin sick. That’s not to say people who aren’t mothers can’t think this is a terrible violation of privacy, it’s more a case of empathy vs sympathy.
Here’s a definition for you in case you can’t wrap your mind around it. “Empathy is the ability to mutually experience the thoughts, emotions, and direct experience of others. It goes beyond sympathy, which is a feeling of care and understanding for the suffering of others.”
BTW I don’t own a range rover, I don’t even own a car or drive – nor do I drink coffee – so you can stick your yummy mummy sterotype.
Although I must commend this chap for keeping cows and a barn in the most expensive area of central dublin
http://www.insecam.cc/cam/view/144240/
That’s City Hall. Of course there would be bullshit there.
New version of listening into the baby monitors.
from a quick glance of that site, it’s nearly a 50/50 split between people who have them set up over looking the property / grounds of house / shed with animals and people who have them set up over looking a kitchen or a sofa ?????
Kind of hysterically missing the point…
“Someone in Kells needs to know that their child is being broadcast online!”
No, someone in Kells needs to stop broadcasting an insecure camera pointed at their child that anyone could easily access. Which is the point of the site.
See the FAQ: http://www.insecam.cc/faq/
So basically someone in Kells needs to know their child is being broadcast online as they obviously don’t know.
Lets not act like the point of the website is to highlight tech security problems. It’s there to exploit them.
Indeed JB. Although when I read of this story elsewhere it did mention that you might be breaking the law (depending on the jurisdiction) by accessing the streams, even if they are openly being broadcast. The News of the World “hacking” was just journalists trying the default mailbox code for phones, but it was still illegal. I’m not sure what the law here says about it, but someone could enlighten us maybe?
This is not the same as hacking someone’s voicemail.
I didn’t say it was the same, I said that accessing the streams might be illegal. But there are clearly parallels between the two, which is what I was highlighting. Just because someone doesn’t change the default password to their web camera doesn’t make it fair game to view.
Should I call them?
Webcam Busters?
Who you gonna call?
Called local Guards in Kells.
Ah grand. They can watch the feed until they see the parents arms reach in to collect/deposit said baby. They can then run a screengrab through their human arms database.
If that doesn’t work they can do the MyDouble similiarity test with the babies face against all confirmation photos published in the Meath Chronicle for the past 30 years to find the ma or da.
Sorted.
Super Nanny is about to get BUSTED!
Would you not be a bit more freaked out if they could identify the house from that webcam image?
I identified the location of a house once when I looked at it. Savage.
Once upon a time kids, the internet was actually a little bit difficult to get on. You had to buy a modem, install some drivers and if you were unlucky, pull a bit of jiggery pokery with isp connection settings. It wasn’t THAT hard but it did ensure that you never had to read anything like this.
Well if the child doesn’t have anything to hide and isn’t doing anything illegal; then why should the mother be bothered by the surveillance?
So are these IP cams different to the bog-standard usb webcams? Because they have a dedicated IP address? I isnt a komputer expert, no sir.
Short answer, yes.
Longer answer, they’re like your USB webcam and a really awful laptop all rolled into one box. Plug in power, connect to wifi, stream to the intertubes.
So are normal USB webcams okay, or do they need passwords too
“Another camera, situated in the lady’s (sic) bathroom of a Dublin pub, shows customers……..” WTF
and I don’t mean the unsecured webcam hackers
This is hardly new. Its beens this way for years. If you want to see something that will really put hair on your chest have a look at the “popular searches” ticker on http://www.shodanhq.com/
My personal favorite is: http://www.shodanhq.com/search?q=Set-Cookie%3A+iomega%3D – Its people home servers that they haven’t bothered securing.
Hundreds of simple searches for webcams too: http://www.shodanhq.com/search?q=webcamxp
That’s not gonna put hair on your chest.
The UK intelligence community having access to everyone’s webcams and sending the images on to the NSA, that’ll put hairs on your chest.
US schools giving out free laptops to teenagers then spying on them at home via the laptop webcams, that’d put hairs on your chest.
This is just people not reading the manual.
Laptops with webcams used for spying………..you’d half expect that carry-on/capability
That’s not gonna put hair on your chest.
Remember a couple of years ago David Petraeus boasting openly as the then head of CIA of their capability to spy on anybody (make that everybody) via our television sets and seemingly innocuous household appliances such as remote controls, clock radios, fridges, washing machines, ovens even doorbells – basically adding low-powered, cheaper processors chips and web connections to previously ‘dumb’ home appliances – designed to add the internet to almost every kind of electrical appliance.
It’s the concept described as the ‘internet of things’.
Spies will no longer have to plant bugs in your home, breaking and entering – the rise of ‘connected’ gadgets controlled by apps will mean that people ‘bug’ their own homes, said the CIA man ‘Betrayus’.
http://www.blogicalcomment.com/the-spy-in-your-home-blogiquotes/1803/
Now, that’d put hairs on your chest…………in fact, big woolly mammoth, double-knit, plain & purl, dreadlocks variety
Orwell was bang on the money with ‘1984’
F*ck ’em all……..they’re not getting me………………….I’m off to join the Amish……….
Lads, you’re clearly from a technical background.
Have you actually looked at what ShodanHQ does? It automates header inspection. Its not the CIA you need to worry about. When you mention internet of things, thats the big issue – tools like SHodan are sub-script kiddy. Anyone can potentially use these tools to muck you around.