The Real Reason I Don't Have a Security Camera

(Photo by Thomas Trutschel/Getty Images)

My partner and I recently got a dog, which for millenials is about the same as saying we had a child. Now, we already had, and still have, other pets in our home. Our mischief of adorable, pink-nosed rats may vary in size but it’s been a constant in the lives of my partner and myself for nearly a decade. The thing about rats is that they are as happy in a cage with their rat friends as they are with you. Dogs, on the other hand, aren’t happy when you’re gone and as a result you’re not happy either. When we got the dog (whose name is Lulu and she is the best dog by any and all objective measurements), my partner suggested that we get a webcam or video baby monitor so we could keep tabs on our canine child while we were at work.

I admit, I was tempted. As I mentioned, our pets fill the roles of children for us, and I spend a not-insignificant amount of time fretting about my animals when I’m at work, especially during NYC summers, which combine the heat of Death Valley with the sickening humidity of an armpit. Despite those worries, I was uncomfortable. My partner is very well aware of my paranoiac tendencies, and after we had a talk about it, we’re agreed: we won’t have a security camera in our house.

It’s not, as you might think, because I am afraid of hackers watching my intimate moments or intelligence agencies hearing my every word, although those are real threats. No, my concern is that any internet accessible device on my network could be hijacked and turned into a weapon of online mass destruction.

The Creepy Hacks Are Real But Avoidable

We’ll get to my fears, but first I must acknowledge that, yes, creepy stuff does happen with IoT devices, and it can be really bad. On its own, it’s a valid reason to hestitate before getting a web-connected camera or baby monitor.

Stories abound of people hearing the voices of creepers coming through their baby monitor, or discovering that someone has used the camera in their computer to capture embarrassing pictures. One particularly insidious practice is called “sextortion,” where an attacker threatens to release embarrassing photos taken from a hijacked webcam (which he may or may not actually have) unless the victim provides sexually explicit material. This is disgusting on its own, and the fact that young people are frequently the targets of these attacks is deplorable.

Attacks this heinous are usually harder to carry out because they require targeting a specific individual, but the poor security pedigree of many Internet of Things devices, including some security cameras and connected baby monitors, makes them easier marks. If you want to find a target, you can take a look on Shodan—a search engine of devices connected to the internet. Attacking a specific person would likely involve physical access to the device, or carefully constructed phishing attacks, but Shodan can probably connect you with an unwitting, if somewhat random, victim.

These gross, invasive attacks are a real threat, but they can also be mitigated without a lot of technical know-how. A simple piece of tape across a lense or dry washcloth thrown over a device can render a camera completely blind. Baby monitors can be disconnected—or better yet, not allowed to connect to the internet in the first place. I can handle that on my own.

What Really Scares Me

There was a Black Hat presentation that always stuck with me. In it, the presenter demonstrated how he could take control of a connected security camera. That’s scary, but what got me was the presenter’s point that these cameras were just small Linux computers, and could be used to do anything an attacker wanted. He also claimed that the vast majority of the cameras on the market had…