WASHINGTON 鈥� Your laptops, tablets and smartphones all have cameras staring at you, and it is easier than ever for those cameras to be hacked. It may be a very good idea to keep them from watching you.
The, a D.C.-based think tank, recently released a study titled 鈥溾�� on the risks unsecured, internet-connected cameras pose to both national security and the private sector, as well as to individual users.
It could lead to blackmail.
鈥淲hat would you do to keep compromising images of you off the internet?鈥� James Scott, senior fellow at the ICIT, asked 蜜桃视频app.
If you鈥檙e practicing what the ICIT calls poor cyber-hygiene, a camera hacker has your IP address and therefore likely your name, address, and all your friends on Facebook and other social media. And the hacker is ready to share unless you pay up.
But if you鈥檙e not doing anything wrong, what is there to worry about?
鈥淭o be a victim, you don鈥檛 have to do anything to intentionally compromise yourself. I wouldn鈥檛 want people to see me with no clothes on getting changed for work. I鈥檓 not doing anything wrong. I鈥檓 just getting ready to go do an honest days鈥� work,鈥� he said.
There are high-tech ways to disable your cameras, but hackers also have ways to disable your disables. The simplest way to shut your camera鈥檚 eye is old school.
Cover it up.
鈥淵ou can even do a piece of tape and a small piece of paper under there so it doesn鈥檛 leave residue on your camera. And cover up the microphone as well,鈥� Scott said. (And both can be easily uncovered for when you really want to use the camera and microphone.)
Webcam cover maker , which sells camera covers for about $7, donates 100 percent of its net proceeds to the nonprofit ICIT.
There is the with his tape-covered laptop camera in the background, irony not lost on Scott.
鈥淔ederal agencies as a matter of national security have some kind of surveillance setup, but nobody鈥檚 talking about the 鈥榙ragnet surveillance capitalists鈥� like Google and Facebook,鈥� he said.
