regardless of which side the author personally finds themselves on the privacy debate here; there's cameras directed baby's changing tables. the snapshots are hosted from the ipcrawl itself. it doesn't take a genius to put one and one together. this is potentially generating imagery you absolutely don't want to host from/on your domain.
IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
141–150 of 194 posts
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wonder how plausible it would be to deduce where a given webcam is (some combination of IP data, context clues, visible landmarks, maybe face searching) and then contact the owner to let them know. There used to be this fun site called where-is-this.com where people could share images of public places for others to try to track down; it would be nice to harness something like that for good.
I feel like I’ve read about three letter agencies using the humming of power lines to geo-locate where a video/audio was recorded. “Electrical Network Frequency (ENF) analysis”. I’m going to dig more and will leave some links when I get back to a computer.
You don’t need to be a TLA.
Google “4chan tracks down Shia LaBeouf”
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#143Why don't any of them have sound?
Any way to sort on resolution and frame rate?
Multiple cameras at any one location?
Plot-twist: large bunch of people here are willing to have their life made public.
Would be interesting if people could claim their camera and use the site to keep a long-term archive of footage. AI could detect various activities too and notify owners of thieves, intruders or infidelity. Could also charge outsiders to view. Best if streams were made private first to stop mirror sites. What happens if certain householders or visitors aren't told about the camera while being recorded?
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
No. This isn’t a passive “walked by the window” thing that you might have unwittingly viewed. To actively search for open cameras by crawling every IP then creating a tool to see them, then choosing to watch the footage is a very active, deliberate choice. No one is viewing this footage without making a multi-step choice to view it.
Don't confuse the creators and maintainers with people who click on a link out of curiosity. I also briefly "walked by the window" glancing at cats using automated feeders in china when someone posted that page to HN recently. I'm surprised this is still a thing though. I remember being shocked when I came across an extensive feed of these inadvertently pubic CCTV feeds ~15 years ago. I had assumed it was no longer a…
I thought it was common knowledge you should physically cover any camera even if you believe they are secure
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#145Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#146I can see my house from here!
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know Droitwich, this made me laugh
Droitwich is famous for its 213m Long Wave radio transmission towers. Once the tallest structures in the country and now set to be decommissioned as the BBC shuts down its Long Wave service after 90+ years: https://hackaday.com/2026/06/27/requiem-for-long-wave-as-the... https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c74yn7v7k4qo
We had a whole town dedicated to this called Radio Kootwijk, in the Netherlands.
It's also long been decommissioned.
In one way I think it's a bad idea because long wave works even when satellites and cables no longer work. It's great for emergencies. On the other hand, the number of people with equipment to receive it is shrinking (even though you can build it with a few components). That of course really hampers its value for emergencies.
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#148Hehe, this one has a feeding tray with a novelty sign on it: > Baiting deer is illegal! > This corn pile is intended for squirrels, chipmunks, and other such critters. > Any deer found eating this corn will be shot! https://ipcrawl.com/fun/c/373ef0178c5281a5
For several decades relatives of mine always swept out their trucks after transporting cattle salt blocks or alfalfa bales on the same quiet narrow S shaped section of roadway in the bush about a mile from the house at the back of the property. Amazing how almost every year someone managed to shoot a deer there in the fall.
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
One method (for many trans-NAT routing issues) is the manufacturer provides a proxy on the Internet, creates a secure connection between camera and proxy (controlling both ends, they should be able to navigate NAT issues, etc.), and then securely publishes the video. The manufacturer could encrypt the video E2E so they can't see it. This also hides the camera's location and IP. All with informed consent of course. Ed…
But then you’re tethered to the device manufacturer and probably need other Terrible UX like an account/credentials, password resets, and so on. And that tether also opens the door for the company to remote control the product, spy through telemetry, and remotely “alter the deal” at their whim. Some people might be ok with this but a “tether to the company” is a deal breaker to me for most products.
For most, “these cameras might livestream your bedroom to the open internet if you aren’t tech savvy” is a bigger dealbreaker. And “the product from XYC corp is controlled by XYZ corp” is not concerning, but what they expected.
The idea of tech sovereignty for the sake of it is not an idea that resonates with many people outside of the tech community. Many people buy a product or service based solely on their immediate need.
Re: IP Crawl: Living atlas of open webcams discovered on the public internet
#150Everyone: For a moment forget everything you know about computers and wonder if perhaps 99% of normies are just following the directions on the package of their $19 Chinese IP camera. They have no idea what a firewall is, or what the "public internet" even means. There's also a difference between your neighbor not closing her blinds and you using a telescope to look inside her apartment, which is what sites like this…
> and wonder if perhaps 99% of normies are just following the directions on the package of their $19 Chinese IP camera. I doubt that the instructions for a cheap camera have enough information to walk a non-technical user through the process of setting up port forwarding on their specific router. I could believe that it’s automatic port forwarding via UPnP for some of these cameras. However a lot of them are from con…
Setting port forwarding is the wrong ux for this.
It should be something simple like:
-everything is encrypted
- at install I tap my phone on the camera, now my Google account(or something similar) is linked to it as admin.
- on that some simple key management architecture should be built