111–120 of 241 posts
And I thought I was clever for turning the light on for only a tiny split-second to take a picture... (I wasn't writing malware. I put the program on my own laptop before I sent it in to be serviced. http://ecritters.biz/applecarefacility/ )
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Now all you have to do is warn users that the one LED is important and means something. Not like all the other LEDs that are on all the time and are mostly pointless. http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/10/webcam-spy-settleme... http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2386599,00.asp > When the school district investigated the case, it found other incidents of webcam spying, and notified the students involved, includin…
Malware that spontaneously lights the LED without activating the camera so the user becomes accustomed to a false indicator. Or have the LED turn anytime the machine is left idle (but still on) in order to burn out the LED.
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Same here. Even nude photos would be embarrassing, but audio recordings could have effects far worse than some prude shame. Especially since there is no LED to signal the microphone is active, it doesn't need to point anywhere. If it could be activated while the laptop is closed (force wake up a part of the OS for just a few minutes here and there for instance) it would be a really tough problem.
Maybe unload/delete the kernel module? (This is how I used to silence the pcspkr beep on Linux.)
One does not simply unload/delete kernel module on an iPad...
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"Now all you have to do is warn users that the one LED is important and means something. Not like all the other LEDs that are on all the time and are mostly pointless." No longer plastering devices with semi-pointless LEDs would help. Harddrive activity? Wifi? Bluetooth? I don't think all these lights are really necessary. Throw one on the power cable maybe, and a few to backlight the keyboard, but otherwise only use…
Hey, I find the hard drive light very helpful in determining whether my system is thrashing for virtual memory, or likely stuck on some CPU-bound process.
I want hardware on/off switches for camera, microphone, wifi, bluetooth, and maybe even external speakers. These should be power switches, not switches that make a polite request to firmware for the firmware to act as if the devices are off.
I'd pay someone $10 if I could figure out a way to make sure that my macbook never plays the "I AM NOW TURNING ON" sound.
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Display-mounted cameras should have a sliding lens cap built in which can close (but not open) itself after a configurable period of non-use.
Which then nearly ruins the use case of theft recovery software. Sometimes you want to turn on the camera in software.
I strongly suspect that the number of stolen laptops recovered thanks to the owner being able to use the camera to "invade the privacy and potentially take creep-shots" of the unauthorized current user, is way way smaller than the number of people who've had their privacy invaded and potentially had creepshots taken by their laptops unauthorized "p0wners".
Honestly, I don’t understand why it’s so difficult to create a camera chip not susceptible to any software hack. The camera sensor needs electrical current to work. Simply place the LED inline or in parallel to the camera and you are done. Any time current is sent to the camera sensor, the LED cant help it but light up. My knowledge of electronics is limited, but I know for a fact that this can be achieved without th…
It's not difficult, but it makes the system unflexible, The vendors, not worried about the privacy implications, choose what makes the system more flexible. I've heard that this was a serious flaw in Google's opinion, and they went through great efforts to ensure that the LED for the chromebook pixel was actually hard-wired into the camera's electronics. Which if true, shows that it's indeed possible.
Um. That would be exactly the point of doing it, in this case. The camera indicator (and the microphone indicator that every laptop should but currently does not have) should be completely inflexible.
What "flexibility" is added by having an indicator that only sort-of indicates, anyway?
I thought this was old news.
That's why I disable the webcam in the device manager
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My current Thinkpad has a physical switch to disable radios. I'd like to have a physical 'privacy' switch that cut the power to internal microphones and cameras. To be security aware, this has to be an auditable hardware power switch, and not just an interrupt/driver/bios combination that could be bypassed. It's also prefereable for security to have a an off-by-default switch, than an activity light you might not not…
My current ThinkPad (T400) has the Mic, fingerprint scanner and webcam disabled physically. They're easy to get into and unplug. Agree entirely though. I'd rather like a physical off switch as well like the original IBM PC (the big red lever)