It is quite annoying to view images that aren’t supposed to be shared on the Internet such as the footages from surveillance cameras and err…. napping babies in their bedrooms.
However, web users can view surveillance camera and webcam feeds for only £34 at Shodan.
These feeds include footages showing babies peacefully sleeping in their rooms, kitchens of coffee shops, stores and the back room of several banks, etc. The Internet of Things (IoT) devices are responsible for giving away these kinds of footages since such devices are quite weak in the security department.
You can easily view all sorts of images online for a meager fee via Shodan. It is a search engine that exposes the flaws and weaknesses of IoT devices currently selling around the world. Shodan’s algorithm web crawler searches the Internet for unsecured cameras and immediately presents the footages on the website, according to MotherBoard.
A cam footage a classroom in China / Image Source: Shodan
Cam footage of some restaurant kitchen in Spain / Image Source: Shodan
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Cam footage from Croydon, UK / Image Source: Shodan
Cam footage of a sleeping baby in Canada / Image Source: Shodan
When the web crawler identifies an open port that can be accessed through the live video feed, it basically points towards a glaring weakness inherent to almost all IoT devices. Shodan looks for unsecured cameras through the Real Time Streaming Protocol with the port 554.
It is not a hidden fact that the cheaper webcams usually are low in security as well but these are located everywhere.
The reason for showing these footages at Shodan is to inform users, security experts and IoT devices developers about the highly exploitable nature of these devices. If Shodan can show videos so easily, then anyone can make use of it even malicious cyber criminals.
It is also a fact that even kids’ toys aren’t safe anymore and Mattel’s Hello Barbie dolls are also vulnerable to hacking. These dolls are required to “talk” and “listen” to kids through cloud technology as the toy can be connected to the web with WiFi connection. But, this can be used for other purposes too as a security researcher successfully hacked into one such doll and managed to spy on unsuspecting family. The researcher was able to exploit the mic without even pressing the On button and could easily retrieve audio files stored on the doll.
So, we can assume that IoT devices do not offer such a high layer of protection to consumers as these are supposed to.
Simple Solution:
If you want to save yourself from such situation, just change the default password of your security camera.
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