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How to Find Hidden Cameras and Spy Gear
- loteck 8y agoGoogle cache: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:rZMVkYxBElIJ:https://www.senteltechsecurity.com/blog/post/how-to-find-hidden-cameras/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:rZMVkY...
- andrewstuart 8y agoIs unplugging the power of the router in an AirBNB a good basic security step? Presumably some cameras depend on flash storage rather than Internet connection but many cameras do use Internet connection to function?
- acct1771 8y agoI just cut the power to the house when I arrive.
- ackfoo 8y ago"Today engineers will succeed in restoring water and power to your area, leaving you with hours of hard sledgehammer work to get it back the way you like it." --The Onion
- thisisweirdok 8y agoI burn it down and camp on the ashes.
- smacktoward 8y agoNuke it from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.
- theoh 8y agoHow do you know you're not unplugging a decoy router, with the secure surveillance router concealed somewhere you wouldn't think to look?
- ndiscussion 8y agoThis seems highly unlikely, but like all security, this is just one layer of defense.
- theoh 8y agoIt could be very inconvenient to unplug the router. The real issue is what level of threat you hope to counter. An unexpected extra clock or an extra coffee machine in the room, as mentioned in the article, would not represent a very high-level surveillance tactic. I mean, to try something as blatant as that would be very unimaginative, or at best, evidence of working with very limited options. Is there really a two-bit Airbnb surveillance problem?
- ndiscussion 8y agoI doubt that a sleazy airbnb host would be sophisticated enough to place a decoy router, and if they were, there's probably nothing I could do to stop them. My threat model would be the host trying to blackmail me and/or get their kicks from watching me. A corporate or national actor isn't part of this model, because: - I'm a low-priority target - Prevent highly sophisticated attacks borders on impossible/maddening - The likelihood of the creep is probably 10,000x more I'm not sure unplugging the router would help, but I probably wouldn't find it very inconvenient either (depending on location). Overall it's probably worth a quick try to locate and unplug it - if you can't find it, hedge your bets and try some other opsec techniques. Just my own approach.
- variable11 8y ago> Is there really a two-bit Airbnb surveillance problem? Yes, because the average person is far more likely to be targeted by a two-bit jealous spouse, perverted Airbnb owner, or paranoid neighbor than a sophisticated international spy ring.
- jarfil 8y agoI keep a small (and cheap) separate router for my IoT devices. If I wanted to spy on someone, I'd definitely use one of those, with a USB powerbank acting as a UPS.
- _underfl0w_ 8y agoI've seen other commenters mentioning that they now consider at least scanning the network to be a mandatory step in their check-in process. Personally I try to avoid connecting my devices to others' WiFi on principal - especially if they're... less than tech savvy.
- andrewstuart 8y agoThe most powerful advice in the linked post seems to be infrared scanning for heat. Presuming most cameras generate some sort of heat this would be a good way to locate them.
- jarfil 8y agoMicrophones can be hidden completely out of sight. A long enough lens barrel can put the heat generating electronics far enough from any visible surfaces that the heat signature may become unnoticeable. Also the heat camera is the most expensive method.
- dorfsmay 8y agoAssuming you don't accept bad certs, don't ssh if there's an issue with the host key, don't use http, relent and other plaintext protocols, why?
- alasdair_ 8y agoRight gue CAs and a lack of cert pinning?
- eps 8y agoAnd how would a rogue CA cert get into your cert store? The only issue with random access points when using properly secured connections is the metadata leak - DNS queries, etc. They will now whom you are connecting to, basically. That's it.
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- _underfl0w_ 8y agoThis is an excellent follow-up to the AirBNB story posted here earlier. Tl;dr AirBNB ruled that a host's photo with an easily-glanced-over single camera tucked in a corner was sufficient evidence and documentation of the fact that they had multiple cameras inside - i.e. that the guest should've been aware that there was no expectation of privacy. The article mentioned unplugging said equipment, other comments mentioned guests having found cameras in alarm clocks in AirBnBs, etc.
- gcbw2 8y agoTypical airBNB customer care. How is it they recommend unplugging the cameras, if they say seeing one camera is the same as acknowledging there are other hidden ones? How do you unplug that which you cannot see?!
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- chrsstrm 8y agoI have a routine when entering a hotel room that involves scanning for devices similar to what the article mentions (but not as far as using specialized equipment). I'm not paranoid about being spied on, giving a proper once-over makes me feel more at ease when inside the room. You never find anything, which is always a relief, but a couple years ago when hotels started installing smart mirrors it sure made my heart beat faster when you shut off the bathroom light and look at the mirror with a light source. I've also recently started seeing hall effect switches on hotel room doors. I'm not sure how they are being used, but I usually pull the magnet out of the door and put it on the mini bar and no one comes running thinking the door has been left open. I'm not a fan of the hotel knowing when I come and go. I've seen a motion sensor once but I believe those are more for the room's HVAC.
- bdamm 8y agoOf course the hotel can track your face with lobby cameras, your room key when you authenticate with the elevator and door, and monitor your use of the Wi-Fi, so really they don't need a camera or hall effect sensor to know you are coming and going or get some idea of your preferences.
- chrsstrm 8y agoI would be genuinely surprised if hotels implemented facial recognition. I'm the one who doesn't touch hotel WiFi - cell tethering to the rescue. And yes, all these hotels use NFC keycards, which makes the placement of door sensors even more puzzling. You can't be invisible in a hotel but there is a level of knowledge on your whereabouts that they just don't need. Sadly the Las Vegas incident isn't helping as management is more paranoid than ever of a repeat.
- 9h12dqe 8y agoThey are already doing so. VIP recognition and check-in are two cases.
- kevinSuttle 8y ago> who doesn’t touch hotel WiFi Not even with a custom DNS or VPN?
- Havoc 8y agoSo spend 250+ and carry all that extra gear with me while traveling to hotels? I could see this being a thing in Airbnb though unfortunately.
- kevinSuttle 8y agoSmall price to pay in today’s society. These surveillance devices and storage are only going to get less expensive, and easier to conceal.
- jarfil 8y agoYou can get an RF scanner with a laser lens scanner for $10, and your phone camera is good enough for detecting IR LEDs. The only expensive part is the FLIR camera, but still 3 out of 4 for $10 is not bad.
- ouid 8y agothis article is actually just an advertisement for this product. https://www.senteltechsecurity.com/lawmate-dd802-defender.html https://www.senteltechsecurity.com/lawmate-dd802-defender.ht...
- aboutruby 8y agoAny alternative you would recommend then?
- vertexFarm 8y agohttps://www.ebay.com/itm/Anti-Spy-Hidden-Camera-Lens-Bug-Detector-GSM-GPS-Signal-Finder-RF-Tracker-Audio/302808197942?epid=4008810412&hash=item4680c66b36:g:ubMAAOSwUMxaAAfo:rk:1:pf:0 https://www.ebay.com/itm/Anti-Spy-Hidden-Camera-Lens-Bug-Det... Probably way crappier, but for what these electronics entail the one sold by the website in the post is vastly overpriced. It's a very simple radio, a battery, some LEDs, and an optical filter of some kind. Likely just a red gel. Plus, how great of a bug detector do most people really need? The main features are all there and it's probably workable in most cases. Disclaimer, I don't own this. It could be a mega-turd, don't buy it on my account.
- jchw 8y agoNo offense but your disclaimer kind of offers a reason why someone might buy their product.
- vertexFarm 8y agoThat's not how you should buy tools, though. Unless you're a professional who is making a living with these tools, you don't walk straight up to the Snap-On truck and drop several grand on all the highest quality stuff. You go to Hazard Fraught and get the cheap ones, then you replace the ones that actually wear out or don't cut the mustard with something a few tiers up. Most of it will work just fine for a decade at a twentieth of the price. The crowd here could probably build one of these out of whatever's in the junk drawer. Looks like it's the RX half of a cheap analogue walkie-talkie and some flashing lights. That's it. Two hundred bucks is egregious. Maybe if you were an actual LEO or a private eye, but for most people it makes absolutely no sense to buy the $200 version without first seeing if the $10 version does the job.
- andrewstuart 8y agoHere's a review of a hidden camera digital clock: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMtG_fAL9aI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMtG_fAL9aI And someone using a FLIR infrared camera to find hidden cameras: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndlhlBIG0SQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndlhlBIG0SQ
- tzhenghao 8y agoYou could also roll your own (at your own risk) :) [1] [1] - https://github.com/JulianOliver/dropkick.sh https://github.com/JulianOliver/dropkick.sh
- aboutruby 8y agoWould be nice as an app or a portable device like a button (kind of like the universal remote to shutdown TVs[1]). [1]: https://www.amazon.com/TV-B-Gone-Universal-TV-Control-Keychain/dp/B0006GD9CE https://www.amazon.com/TV-B-Gone-Universal-TV-Control-Keycha...
- AJMaxwell 8y agoWouldn't be too difficult to run it on a Raspberry Pi
- vertexFarm 8y agoI'm interested that it doesn't mention the nonlinear junction detector, but I'm no spyhunter or anything and maybe that's an obsolete piece of equipment now. After all, there's certainly a lot more innocent transistors and diodes out in the world today than there were during the cold war. Also I'm not sure they're legal for just anybody to use since they vomit so much radio interference. An interesting build: http://67.225.133.110/~gbpprorg/mil/non/index.html http://67.225.133.110/~gbpprorg/mil/non/index.html
- weerd 8y agoWoah! The electronics info at this site seems interesting... but stuff gets pretty wild... http://67.225.133.110/~gbpprorg/obama/ http://67.225.133.110/~gbpprorg/obama/
- microdrum 8y agoDid these 67.x links above kill anyone’s device cellular connection? Something dangerous going on there.
- justtopost 8y agoNo, that seems more improbable than the linked ramblings.
- rhcom2 8y agoI pretty quickly stumbled upon a ton of antisemitism, racism and some gore from that site.
- vertexFarm 8y agoOh god. Yeah there's a fair share of weird junk on that site, which probably goes hand-in-hand with having the necessary paranoia to build your own nonlinear junction detector. I found the link on Hackaday way back when, I have no idea about the rest of this shady IP address. Should have probably been more careful about posting something like this, but the electronics builds are so well documented.
- elchief 8y agoIt's funny how in spy movies a sniper or observer has a big ol lens pointed at a target. Govt buildings have lens detectors. And I'd hope high value targets teams do too
- matt-attack 8y ago> Govt buildings have lens detectors. Care to explain? If I point a camera at my local Fed building while walking on the nearby sidewalk, are you telling me that's detected somewhere?
- neltnerb 8y agoI'm surprised it works outdoors, I would think the red light would be impossible to pick out of a high resolution image even with a fine filter.
- bonestamp2 8y agoAs far as I understand, these laser scanners work outdoors in daylight: https://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2013-05/laser-scanning-device-can-detect-faraway-optical-lenses-let-troops-know-who-watching https://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2013-05/laser-scan...
- weinzierl 8y ago> Lasers sweep the surroundings and when they detect a CCD, they fire a bolt of light right at the camera to obliterate any photograph Color me skeptical. Does it detect the lens in the eye too? And then? Does it obliterate my retina when I look at his yacht?
- bonestamp2 8y agoIf you've got a CCD in your eye then ya, I'd be concerned about that.
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- paradoxparalax 8y agoAlso, as any pretty girl in a DongGuan city's Sauna will teach you, put all portable objects inside the room's wardrobe and cover everything you can, including mirrors, with towels, bedsheets, or whatever piece of cloth you can find. Put all flasks of Shampoo or body soap in the wardrobe aswell. Scan the long curtains of the room's window with your eyes and hands. They are really professionals there.
- saagarjha 8y ago> put all portable objects inside the room's wardrobe I'm sorry, but how does this help?
- williamscales 8y agoCould contain a battery powered camera
- saagarjha 8y agoOh, the things in the room. I thought the comment was talking about putting your own portable devices in the wardrobe.
- paradoxparalax 8y agoYes, but they will ask you to put your own portables devices in the wardrobe too, including watches and glasses, even when the glasses have almost no frame to speak of. This is, or was, in the golden times, coincidentally, or not, the industrial hub with more relative freedom for production variety. The state-of-art of the spycamera-ware produced over there back then would make any old shop owner in Shenzhen's eletronic market simply jaw-dropped. Off course, if the guys in Shenzhen weren't afraid of jail, they would have the same stuff at some point. Is a pity people messed up doing too much GSM stuff. You can't have nice things. Same goes for the other industry mentioned. Just Nostalgy left. A lot of legal stuff could be mass-miniaturized by removal of case and tape cover. Long time retired now, don't know last progresses, but probably best stuff available for simple mortals still in Romenia. Best available for simple mortals in the other industry probably still in the same country. Never go near device starting with a J, may become guest of enhanced interview facility. The old memories...
- ILBCNU 8y agoHas anyone considered these pieces of equipment? http://aitproducts.com/products/fiberscopes/micro-fiberscope/fiber-scope-milliscope.html http://aitproducts.com/products/fiberscopes/micro-fiberscope... They are very hard to spot. you have to inspect the area of concern for tack holes or raised features in the wallpaper. As far as price is concerned, there is a fair bit of profit that will be realized short term from the disgusting type of porn that could be generated. Im sure there is some gaurded position regarding sales of these devices, if not there should be.
- 14 8y agoVery cool. Found one on eBay for $5700 so luckily out of reach for the casual snoop. That would be virtually undetectable.
- remcob 8y agoThey are designed for close up work, almost microscope like as you can see in the demo video. I wonder how well they work for a living-room sized scene.
- owenversteeg 8y agoDepth of field is measured in millimeters for everything they list. I wonder if that's a requirement of the hardware or something that can be overcome.
- mookiestix 8y agodepth of field issues are non existent if you use an aperature disk. if you can afford a fibre optic device you can create the pinhole lens system with aperatures, no glass required. if you want to go to these lengths then you probably work with or for some alphabet soup federal agency.
- natadvstan 8y agowould you drink from a bucket if it only had one little turd floating in it?
- crb002 8y agoCurious why they aren't using public key encryption when writing to the SD card if they went to that much trouble hiding it.
- cf141q5325 8y agoPower consumption I would assume
- deytempo 8y agoIf it’s an IP camera, you can solve the problem by carrying a little switch and patch cable. The switch plugged into an Ethernet port, then the jumper cable plugged across two of the ports in the switch. If the camera is on the same network no appreciable amount of data will be getting from that camera back to where it is supposed to be recording
- go_prodev 8y agoWhy is that? Wouldn't it just double the data volume, or does it do something else?
- TeMPOraL 8y agoIt'll make the switch gum the network up with broadcast and multicast packets forever looping around the switch. Back in my high school days, looping two Ethernet ports with a patchcord was a trick you could use to take down the entire school network. I was under impression that modern hardware has safeguards against that, though.
- citrin_ru 8y agoThis safeguard is called STP (spanning tree protocol). I've seen it only in managed swithes and most SOHO swithes are unmanaged. It is easy to detect usage of STP using tcpdump.
- alanh 8y agoWhat?
- navinsylvester 8y agoYou can do basic detection via mobile app itself and they are surprisingly good. I know they can't replace dedicated gadgets but for most it should be enough and convenient. On android i use Ultimate EMF Detector PRO and Hidden Camera(PRO version). These should help you to detect electro magnetic field emanating from devices and infrared camera. Be very careful while selecting the app since there are lot of similar apps in the market from shady looking companies.
- bogle 8y agoWho are the developers of those two apps? In the app store that's the distinguishing feature between the Hidden Camera apps at least.
- inteligencenet 8y agousing IR devices or buy RF detector from amazon to avoid hidden camera
- weinzierl 8y agoDoesn't mention the good old Nonlinear Junction Detector. (NLJD) [1] or The Broom as they call it. It can find any unshielded device containing semiconductors, no matter if the device is powered or not - which is pretty cool. It is possible to build one yourself which is even cooler. Although I have to say, while it is a WW II era device, DIY building is not a beginners project. The British documentary "The Spying Game - Walls Have Ears" has a good interview with its inventor that even includes a demo of the device by him in his wonderful old school lab[2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonlinear_junction_detector https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonlinear_junction_detector [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EWYI9zfF9Y#t=22m30s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EWYI9zfF9Y#t=22m30s
- ohazi 8y agoHa! So we may not be able to scan for "life forms" ala Star Trek, but apparently we have a somewhat universal scan for semiconductors. That's amazing!
- pavel_lishin 8y agoWell, not life forms as we know them, anyway.
- bobwaycott 8y agoYet.
- acqq 8y ago> It can find any unshielded device containing semiconductors, no matter if the device is powered or not - which is pretty cool. From Wikipedia: “professional covert listening devices (bugs) of the Central Intelligence Agency were equipped from 1968 onwards with a so-called isolator.”
- consp 8y agoCan't a well build device mitigate this by just using up the energy provided by the NLJD before it is re-transmitted by the semiconductors as a harmonic of the original signal? As far as I my knowledge goes of these, it can detect the created harmonics of the original signal.
- smarks 8y agoOne quick and cost-effective way to detect IR light is by using the front-facing camera on your phone. Unlike the rear-facing camera, the front-facing camera does not have an IR filter and can easily pick up IR lights in the dark. To try this at home, grab your TV remote, which uses IR light to send information to your TV and open the front-facing camera on your phone. Next, point the front end of the remote at the camera and press any of the remote buttons. The IR light that is normally not visible will be completely visible on your camera screen. Well I’ll be darned. This works! (iPhone 7)
- TeMPOraL 8y agoI don't remember seeing a rear-facing camera for which it wouldn't work. Are there extra IR filters installed on newest models, or is that an Apple thing?
- scld 8y agoThe newer iphones block 850nm almost completely. I was shining one at a half watt led just the other day and couldn't see anything. Can't remember the iPhone model.
- londons_explore 8y agoMany phones are getting better IR filters because sunsets and fireplaces both have large amounts of IR in, and without the filters it's hard to get a decent picture. People rarely use the front facing camera for those things.
- tapland 8y agoI was also surprised. My old Galaxy S6 detected it fine (which is great when DIY-ing a TrackIR). I have to go home, plug it in and see if newer phones are any different.
- TeMPOraL 8y agoMy S7 handless this as well, and every Android phone I ever tried this on has a rear camera receptive to IR (I usually test it on TV remotes).
- cyborgx7 8y agoWhy does a completely static blogpost have a loading animation? Some really bad engineering decisions have been made here.
- frankzinger 8y agoIf only there were readily-available tools to find hidden website bloat. /s (directed at them, not you) 9,70 MB / 7,93 MB transferred; many 100+ and 500+KB images, two over 1MB; one 800KB (minimised!) stylesheet. Pretty crazy. Took over 1 minute to load on my 2Mb/s connection.
- ffvhhbbgfcgbhf 8y agoAs a pervert/voyeur I can recommend these tips for spotting 19 out of 20 such pervs. The thermal being most effective.
- pcdoodle 8y agoThis ia paranoid as hell. If you really needed to worry about it, you wouldn't be reading this article.
- tchaffee 8y agoIt's not that paranoid if you use AirBnB a lot. I have caught one owner spying on me with video, and so have some of my friends who use AirBnB as much as I do. It's easy for the owner to mentally justify the invasion of privacy with the excuse of protecting their property. When it happened to me I was on my way to a friend's wedding so I didn't want to get the police involved, but in hindsight I wish I had.
- aldamiz 8y ago"The best way to check for a two-way mirror is by using your fingertip. On most mirrors, if you place your fingertip on the mirror, the reflection of it will not touch. Instead, it will leave a quarter inch gap or so" Went to check all mirrors at home, and placed my fingertip on them. In all, the reflection of my finger touches my finger. I'm gonna need to have a serious conversation with my wife now.
- vldx 8y agoI’ve done the same and had the exact same experience. What is the reason for that?
- borgel 8y agoI assume it has to do with which side the reflective coating is on? If it's on the room-facing face there is no gap. If it's on the backing (wall-side face) there is a gap as thick as the glass.
- sm4rk0 8y agoThe reflective coating (silver or alumin(i)um) of a glass mirror is usually on its back. Gap should be twice the glass thickness because the light travels the distance twice.
- harshulpandav 8y agoThere's also a research paper on this subject. Some of the information in it might no longer be relevant in today's world though. http://www.tentacle.franken.de/papers/hiddencams.pdf http://www.tentacle.franken.de/papers/hiddencams.pdf
- kingofhdds 8y agoMy hidden bullshit detector says it's an advertising article playing on fears, and having fake comments below it.
- crankylinuxuser 8y agoI've proposed a talk at CircleCityCon that includes this area... except the software stack I'm using makes sounds and then rapidly watches a large swath of spectrum to find FM bugs. I can also pick up 802.11* bugs too with standard wireless hacking toolset that we're all familiar with. I can't pick up video with it (5.8GHz FPV modules), but that shouldn't be too hard to add at a later date. I also can't pick up "record to SD" style of bugs. There's nothing to pick up radio widse, and their tempest emissions are too miniscule to detect.
- Pigo 8y agoI guess I'm lucky that I'm not important enough for anyone to bug me, besides taking amazing video of me going at it with my hot wife going at it in a hotel. Now that I think about it, someone would hit the jackpot if they got us on film.
- dakpan 8y agoWhy does he have 2 clocks, a bed, a toilet and a bathtub in the same room?
- dakpan 8y agoWhy does he have 2 clocks, a bed, a bathtub and a toilet in the same room?
- pohl 8y agoBookmarking this for when we need to sweep the white house in a couple years.
- manishsharan 8y agoDidnt Hilton pay large sum of money to an ESPN reporter to settle a voyeur cam issue ? This is why I choose Hilton -- they know spying on me or enabling spying on me is going to be expensive for them. For people using AirBnB -- the best you can hope for is your pictures don't end up on a fetish site.
- Giorgi 8y agoCamera inside alarm clock will pass all these tests.
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- heyjudy 8y agoThis is a real problem for females in Korea, where spy cameras are a real thing. So much so, there's a Korean word for, it "molka," and a Kickstarter for a handheld device that can find even pinhole cameras based on reflected visible light from an array of LEDs. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spyassociates/spyfinder-pro-hidden-camera-detector-spying-preven https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spyassociates/spyfinder...
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- SudoEpoch 8y agoCameras are easy to find. You use red glasses (laser safety ppe) and a red light source. The type of polymer they coat lenses in is highly reflective in the red spectrum. With out getting into too many details you just shine the light around looking for strong pin pricks of red light. I've got experience doing this for over 20 years and this is by far the most effective approach 100% of the time.