5 ms·

I have said this before: the reason why people find a hidden camera much worse than a visible camera is simple. People aren’t dumb, they make trade-off choices.

by baxtr 8y ago

I have said this before: the reason why people find a hidden camera much worse than a visible camera is simple. People aren’t dumb, they make trade-off choices. Of course they could spy on you with a visible camera, too. But either you know and don’t care and still buy the damn thing or you don’t. Knowing means in this case being able to make an informed decision. Not informing customers about a camera inside a home device feels like they don’t want you to consider this fact in your decision making...

gcb0 8y ago
wait, that's even in question?
benj111 8y ago
Plus if you know about it you can cover it over etc. And get to question why they even need a camera to start with, before buying the product.
jstanley 8y ago
I agree with you in principle, but I think the Nest actually only includes a hidden microphone, not a hidden camera.
- ehsankia 8y ago
  Many other Nest products, such as the Smoke alarm, doorbell and camera have microphones too. I agree that not disclosing that one was bad, but realistically if you have a Nest home, you probably have at least one microphone somewhere. It also comes down to much you trust them that the microphone was disabled. If you don't, then you probably also shouldn't be carrying a smartphone with you either.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
- iamrobschiavone 8y ago
  Yep, it's "only" a microphone, but it's still an inexcusable breach of trust.
  - pdkl95 8y ago
    The breach of trust is bad enough, but the fact that it is a microphone opens the possibility of criminal wiretapping charges.
    - sneak 8y ago
      The rules for you and I are not the same rules for Google.
    - Gaelan 8y ago
      Even if the mic was never on?
      - harry8 8y ago
        Yes! Even if the gun to your head was never fired.
        vsl 8y ago
        This is either stupid or dishonest. A gun to your head is a threat of violence - that’s the criminal act. Threatening murder is a crime in itself. The crime of wiretapping would be secretly listening/recording (and willfully so, not by accident as e.g. when baby monitors cross-talk). Having an inactive piece of hardware present, with no intention of using it for spying, is not a crime. Having the hardware present is extremely unlikely to be nefarious. It could have been (a probably was) future-proofing. It could be a bundled package (unlikely I think for a mic, but you e.g. pretty much can’t buy cheap motion sensors without temp and luminosity bundled, so things like Philips Hue motion sensors measure temperature too).
        harry8 8y ago
- akira2501 8y ago
  This is something I always ask people with those little "camera blockers" attached to their laptops: "How do you block the microphone?" and "Which is worse? Recording video of you all day, or recording audio of you all day?
  - smelendez 8y ago
    That's a good point. I think it varies from person to person. Part of my reason for blocking video is I can never figure out when videoconferencing tools will default to transmitting video, which I never want, before I have a way to turn it off. Also, I don't think I'm a high profile enough target that somebody would bother sifting through everything I say in front of my laptop for something interesting. Capturing images every minute or so and looking for something embarrassing (someone showing lots of skin) seems much easier for malware to automate.
    - trevyn 8y ago
      >I don't think I'm a high profile enough target that somebody would bother sifting through everything I say in front of my laptop for something interesting. The threat model is closer to automated transcription, global history search, and parallel construction.
      - smelendez 8y ago
        I think that would be hard to pull off in the US, where I live. There are enough paranoid infosec people that would spot the data transmission or CPU usage. But certainly no harm done in muffling or ripping out a mic if you're concerned!
        r00fus 8y ago
        Not if it’s intermittent / on-demand and hiding within existing traffic.
        pdkl95 8y ago
        Why would anybody bother trying to hide traffic? Lots of apps already waste bandwidth and CPU to exfiltrate a wide variety of data, often sending it straight to Facebook[1]. They simply relabeled it "analytics", [1] https://media.ccc.de/v/35c3-9941-how_facebook_tracks_you_on_android https://media.ccc.de/v/35c3-9941-how_facebook_tracks_you_on_...

by baxtr 8y ago

gcb0 8y ago

wait, that's even in question?

benj111 8y ago

Plus if you know about it you can cover it over etc. And get to question why they even need a camera to start with, before buying the product.

jstanley 8y ago

I agree with you in principle, but I think the Nest actually only includes a hidden microphone, not a hidden camera.

ehsankia 8y ago
Many other Nest products, such as the Smoke alarm, doorbell and camera have microphones too. I agree that not disclosing that one was bad, but realistically if you have a Nest home, you probably have at least one microphone somewhere. It also comes down to much you trust them that the microphone was disabled. If you don't, then you probably also shouldn't be carrying a smartphone with you either.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
iamrobschiavone 8y ago
Yep, it's "only" a microphone, but it's still an inexcusable breach of trust.
- pdkl95 8y ago
  The breach of trust is bad enough, but the fact that it is a microphone opens the possibility of criminal wiretapping charges.
  - sneak 8y ago
    The rules for you and I are not the same rules for Google.
  - Gaelan 8y ago
    Even if the mic was never on?
    - harry8 8y ago
      Yes! Even if the gun to your head was never fired.
      - vsl 8y ago
        This is either stupid or dishonest. A gun to your head is a threat of violence - that’s the criminal act. Threatening murder is a crime in itself. The crime of wiretapping would be secretly listening/recording (and willfully so, not by accident as e.g. when baby monitors cross-talk). Having an inactive piece of hardware present, with no intention of using it for spying, is not a crime. Having the hardware present is extremely unlikely to be nefarious. It could have been (a probably was) future-proofing. It could be a bundled package (unlikely I think for a mic, but you e.g. pretty much can’t buy cheap motion sensors without temp and luminosity bundled, so things like Philips Hue motion sensors measure temperature too).
        harry8 8y ago
akira2501 8y ago
This is something I always ask people with those little "camera blockers" attached to their laptops: "How do you block the microphone?" and "Which is worse? Recording video of you all day, or recording audio of you all day?
- smelendez 8y ago
  That's a good point. I think it varies from person to person. Part of my reason for blocking video is I can never figure out when videoconferencing tools will default to transmitting video, which I never want, before I have a way to turn it off. Also, I don't think I'm a high profile enough target that somebody would bother sifting through everything I say in front of my laptop for something interesting. Capturing images every minute or so and looking for something embarrassing (someone showing lots of skin) seems much easier for malware to automate.
  - trevyn 8y ago
    >I don't think I'm a high profile enough target that somebody would bother sifting through everything I say in front of my laptop for something interesting. The threat model is closer to automated transcription, global history search, and parallel construction.
    - smelendez 8y ago
      I think that would be hard to pull off in the US, where I live. There are enough paranoid infosec people that would spot the data transmission or CPU usage. But certainly no harm done in muffling or ripping out a mic if you're concerned!
      - r00fus 8y ago
        Not if it’s intermittent / on-demand and hiding within existing traffic.
      - pdkl95 8y ago
        Why would anybody bother trying to hide traffic? Lots of apps already waste bandwidth and CPU to exfiltrate a wide variety of data, often sending it straight to Facebook[1]. They simply relabeled it "analytics", [1] https://media.ccc.de/v/35c3-9941-how_facebook_tracks_you_on_android https://media.ccc.de/v/35c3-9941-how_facebook_tracks_you_on_...