I couldn’t find a post in this community about cameras so I figured I’d make one. Requirements:
- No “sign up” required to record video
- Video is stored locally
- Video is in a non-propriatary format
- Can work offline
Optional/Discussion Points:
- Can wireless connectivity be hardware disabled
- Can auto-update be disabled
- Does the device try to “phone home” if it is connected to wifi
- Disk encryption would be nice but I doubt that’ll be an option for anything other than self-hosted stuff
Does anyone know about Lorex (it seems more privacy centered)?
I’m highly technical, so feel free to mention self hosted raspberry pi soltuions as well.
Which is once again, the reason why understanding your threat surface properly so that you set up security enclaves which let you get value from cloud services without sacrificing privacy is more important than ever. Honestly, these posts frustrate me a bit. People are going to give up real, tangible security benefits of these modern security services over the spectre of relatively minor privacy issues which can be almost entirely mitigated with some pretty simple best practices that anyone interested in security should be doing anyway.
perhaps since we’re in a privacy focused community, you can share your views on what these “relatively minor” privacy spectres are, and how you would mitigate them?
Relatively minor from the perspective that the actual information which will leak from a Nest camera isn’t really that unique. And as a network device, it’s fairly simple to isolate and secure. The video a doorbell camera shoots is generally of “in view” public space, already visible to any camera. Your identity is already likely tied to the installation address where you’ve paid for the account with your credit card, which is also probably tied to that same address. If these things are not true, then you should obviously defer to your individual threat profile and disregard what I say.
The worst part of it is that these doorbell cameras could provide a state actor with a daily face shot database, but if you control it, then it can also be an adversarial source to that end.
But “minor” for me, is different from “minor” for you. For me, petty crime, and maybe some local cops with beef are a much bigger deal than hiding from the feds. That’s my whole point here. Know your own threat profile. If officer Barbrady kicks down your door and violates your rights, he’s going to take your local video server, but he’s much less likely to get access to some random silicon valley colo farm. Don’t fear the cloud, understand how to use it as a tool within your own threat profile.
Alerts, notifications, person recognition, object recognition, motion detection, two way audio, automated lights, event based video storage, 24/7 video storage, automated deletion of stale recorded video, and more can all be accomplished 100% locally.
Granted, much of this functionality is not easily accomplished without some technical knowledge and additional hardware. However, these posts typically are made by people who state to at least have an interest in making that a reality (as this one does).
What security benefits does a cloud service provide?