111–120 of 218 posts
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It seems reasonable to assume that a bad actor who is able to gain access to a computer's webcam could also override the software that activates said "on" light.
Most laptops have them wired in hardware, i.e. you can't power on the webcam without the circuit also lighting up the light as a side effect.
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If you have that much faith in the security of your computer, you are "an idiot". That's not within your control. It's not dumb to take whatever precautions you can. And people do worry about having their pictures taken. Remember the scandal when a school took pictures of children undressed at home with their laptops' cameras? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbins_v._Lower_Merion_School...
Yes, I read that story. But you are missing the point. I do not trust in the security of my laptop implicitly, or any laptop for that matter, but I weigh my risks proportionally. I care a lot about the security of my laptop because I care about my bank accounts, my files, and things that I discuss in the privacy of my own house. Out of all those things, people stealing pictures of me in front of my computer are not e…
They aren't idiots for realizing that humans are, above all else, sexual animals.
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That custom run you've described sounds like exactly the sort of "interesting" order I'd like to intercept and backdoor (as part of NSA's TAO or some other yet unnamed organization). Personally I'd prefer to buy off-the-shelf hardware and just snip the mic and camera.
Yes, but there are solutions to this (cut-and-choose, published specs, etc.)
So, OEM buys 10k units, chooses a few samples and tests them. Then he sends all the units on to his logistics warehouse to fulfill customer orders. The shipment from the testing facility to the warehouse is an interesting target now. Alternatively, the outgoing orders from that logistics warehouse.
An induvidual customer buying one laptop is no closer to his goal of ensuring no outside party tampered with it.
> published specs
I'm curious how published specs help a regular user verify his laptop does not contain manufacturing backdoors.
I've seen many suggestions for hardware integrity, but none of them enables the end user to verify that his hardware exactly matches with the published schematics/ASIC masks. They all simplify the problem description to only reach part of the way, requiring trust on part of the end user in all the later links in the chain. Or they just assume that the customer is buying 10k units - which does nothing to help individual end-users.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I read that story. But you are missing the point. I do not trust in the security of my laptop implicitly, or any laptop for that matter, but I weigh my risks proportionally. I care a lot about the security of my laptop because I care about my bank accounts, my files, and things that I discuss in the privacy of my own house. Out of all those things, people stealing pictures of me in front of my computer are not e…
You may not care about naked pictures, but many people do. They aren't idiots for realizing that humans are, above all else, sexual animals.
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You may not care about naked pictures, but many people do. They aren't idiots for realizing that humans are, above all else, sexual animals.
If putting tape over your camera makes you feel safer, by all means go for it. My guess is though, given that you are on HN and such, that your security efforts didn't stop at pealing some electrical tape and applying it to your laptop. The problem is (anecdotally, in my experience) many peoples efforts stop right there. The FEEL safer without actually being safer. This boils down to perception of safety vs. reality…
I'm sure putting tape over the camera isn't the only security precaution the director of the FBI has taken.
Is it just me or is there at least one other person laughing their ass-off. Honestly, I am not sure to know if I am laughing at or feeling sorry for the FBI director. I felt that the director of FBI would not be scared of anyone monitoring him.
I care about audio so much more than video, and text/keys/etc captured from the machine even more. As long as my screen and keyboard are out of the frame of the camera, I don't really care about it getting RATed. At worst, you'll see me naked, or making angry/etc. faces at someone on irc or email. While embarrassing it would be less bad than most of what you could accomplish by stealing actual information. OTOH, carr…
Most people would settle for a physical switch, that is, a switch in hardware.
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Some Lenovo ThinkCentre all-in-one PCs have a physical sliding webcam cover, and you can see at a glance what position it's in. Microphones are harder to handle in such a low tech way, though.
Shorting the two wires of the mic together with a low-value resistor will do what you want, or you can have a physical disconnect switch. It's very easy to modify a mic in this manner if desired. You can even have the switch built into the sliding webcam cover. On digital mics it's a bit more complex to mute without disabling, but the brute force solution is to disconnect their power line in the same manner. Then aga…
Personally, I am not worried about quite sophisticated attackers. When securing my house I'm worried about run-of-the-mill burglars, and this is like that.