Guangzhou police cracked the province’s first case of illegal intrusion into conventional camera hackers

Keywords hacker control camera

Hackers control other people’s home cameras to spy on privacy online

Guangzhou police cracked the province’s first case of illegal intrusion into conventional camera hackers

People who try on wedding dresses in the wedding dress shop are “surrounded” online, but they are “peeped” by outsiders remotely… Recently, the Internet Police Detachment of Guangzhou Public Security Bureau of Guangdong Province, together with the Zengcheng District Public Security Branch, set up a special team to detect and use mobile phone Trojans to remotely control them. A new type of cybercrime case involving the camera captures He Mou, the “silent voyeur” suspect.

It is understood that this case is the first hacker case of illegally invading conventional cameras in Guangdong Province. With the continuous development of technology applications, remote monitoring of the elderly and children through cameras has become the first choice for many families. Black and gray industry personnel aim at the vulnerabilities of surveillance cameras, scan the entire network for devices with weak passwords, and use software programs with mobile phone Trojans to illegally access surveillance cameras to realize online viewing and real-time playback of surveillance videos. After obtaining the relevant permission information, the criminal suspects remarks and sells the surveillance videos of different places, but the victim does not know it.

Earlier, the Internet Police Detachment of the Guangzhou Public Security Bureau got a clue when carrying out the “I do practical things for the masses” practice activity. Hackers invaded and stole the password of the home camera and sold it to others for peeping. In order to crack the modus operandi of this new type of cybercrime and dig deep into the criminals, Guangzhou police analyzed the clues involved in the case, combined with the logic of the crime, and found out the Electronic records of the mobile phone Trojan program intruding into the monitoring equipment. He was later arrested in Nansha District.

He confessed that since December 2019, by forming a large number of groups to collect information on surveillance camera permissions, he illegally invaded and controlled more than 10 types of home cameras, and obtained videos for his own viewing or to communicate with group friends. He is currently under criminal detention by the police.

“Many shopping malls have installed video surveillance in order to facilitate management. Many families also install cameras at home in order to prevent burglary or to care for children and the elderly.” According to the police handling the case, in recent years, various cameras have emerged one after another. Inexpensive and affordable, easy to install and use, surveillance cameras have become one of the most widely used tools in families. He has more than 500 sets of surveillance cameras, mainly involving private places such as bridal shops, supermarket changing rooms and family bedrooms, of which about 70% are used by families.

Because the vast majority of users are not aware of the possible security loopholes in the camera, and do not reset complex passwords, some even buy some cheap and low-quality cameras without multiple security protections in order to save money. This insensitivity to camera passwords and security has left an opportunity for some criminals to expose personal privacy to voyeurs. Some criminals don’t even need to have a high level of computer skills, they just need to buy hacking software “for fools” and quickly scan them in random batches. Some device passwords with weak passwords can be easily obtained. Illegal unauthorized access, enabling online viewing and playback.

According to the police handling the case, after the hackers obtain the passwords in batches, they will sell the passwords to the next-level “dealers” in batches. In this case, He Mou was not highly educated and engaged in physical labor. In order to satisfy a strong desire to voyeurize, he purchased accounts and passwords in bulk, conducted research annotations and exchanged “resources” with the same enthusiasts.

In the black-ash industry chain, “distributors” like He Mou, in order to sell at a good price or exchange “resources” for “communication”, carry out secondary processing of the purchased batch accounts, look through and study the characteristics one by one, The principle of “fat and thin matching” is packed into a compressed package. The compressed package sold has specific account numbers, related passwords, and feature tags, so that buyers can easily and accurately purchase the video type they want without spending too much effort. In order to minimize the risk of exposure and be a “silent voyeur”, they also agreed that “the camera should not be turned casually”.

In this case, although He only exchanged resources and did not sell for profit, his behavior quickly expanded the scope of citizens’ privacy violations, and the holders after the exchange also had corresponding sales channels, resulting in an incalculable divergent “peeping” behavior, suspected of illegal control of computer information systems.

With the increasing maturity of network technology, video surveillance equipment has become an important equipment for individuals to protect the safety of family life and property. Because the surveillance video is peeped, it belongs to the most secret space of the common people. Some parents’ short things are all exposed in front of outsiders, which is easy to cause irreversible physical and mental harm to the parties. At present, the chaos of surveillance cameras is frequent, which puts forward new requirements for comprehensive management. At present, the police have strengthened the crackdown on the black and gray industry chain, and focused on solving problems from the source, increasing the crackdown on the production and sale of cracked software and secondary dissemination of “dealers”.

The police reminded that enterprises should also fulfill corresponding social responsibilities. While pursuing economic interests, they should also pay attention to user experience and privacy security, strengthen investment in background maintenance, and effectively protect user privacy. Residents should be alert to network security risks when using related equipment, avoid installing cameras in scenarios involving personal privacy, regularly change complex passwords, continuously improve protective barriers, and do not be curious about other people’s surveillance videos. If you find that the camera at home is abnormal, please turn off the monitoring equipment in time and call the police immediately.

The Links:   7MBI100U4E-120   LMM86S027A2DE