Hackers could be watching every move inside homes.
Webcams and baby monitors hooked up to the wireless internet are becoming increasingly vulnerable to attack.
Megan Klaassen knew something was wrong when her baby monitor camera was moving, and she wasn’t controlling it.
“I yelled into the camera, and I was, like, ‘Quit watching me,’ but I didn’t know what to do,” Klaassen said.
Klaassen’s webcam was hacked. Cybersecurity expert Wes Withrow, with Trace Security, says hackers have tools to search the entire internet for vulnerable cameras that are on a wireless network.
“They might go to the manual, and typically, they’ll just use the default login credentials,” said Withrow. “Ninety five percent of the cameras in the market have vulnerabilities out the box.”
Once hackers gain access, they can remotely move web cam, record audio and video, and even talk to people. It happened to nanny Ashley Stanley. ;She heard a voice, commenting on the dirty diaper she was changing on baby Sammy.
“I was kinda really freaked out, like, maybe someone hacked into the camera. He said something like, ‘You should probably password protect your camera,'” Stanley said.
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“Security experts say there are simple ways to protect your system from hackers. One of the first things you should do — change your passwords,” said Danielle Nottingham, with CBS News.
Last year, hackers got access to thousands of web cams and baby monitors and live-streamed the video on a Russian website.
Many of the hacked webcams were left in their default settings with weak passwords.
“As soon as you get home and get it connected to your network, change all of the default passwords, and go online and download any software updates that need to be applied to it as well,” Withrow said.
Withrow says only connect devices that you need to the webcam to minimize your exposure to hackers.
Cybersecurity experts also recommend disabling the audio and cover the camera lens, or unplug webcams when they are not in use.
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