Nest Cam status lights can no longer be turned off for privacy | Hacker News Reader

Nest Cam status lights can no longer be turned off for privacy

androidpolice.com

33 pointsmarklyon47 comments

Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20700810

Having a status light ON for an outside camera seems smart for both sides – pro-privacy & communicating the property is under surveillance. What sounds frustrating is that when your network / wifi connection goes down the status light flashes amber – there was never a way to turn this feature off even if you had the status light off (previously). If you're a potential thief and you see am amber flashing light on a Drop/Nest cam, you know you're not being recorded. That's the bummer with cloud-only camera recording, there is no redundancy. I wish there was an option to "hide" error states in the status light and just keep it on as if nothing is wrong.

Of course the discussion so far has been limited to whether you should have a choice when your camera is inside the home and used for things like a nursery/baby cam? Should you have a choice "hiding" a camera to record anyone who breaks in?

I don't have good blanket answers, however I think it's illegal in Germany to record someone without consent, even if it's an intruder in your own home. Right now it seems the decision has been made for Google camera owners.

I don't know how nest camera is built like, but can't you cover the light with a bit of tape and be done with it?

Yes, but you risk also blocking the IR illuminators that let it work at night.

>As it turns out, many people use these security cams to secure their homes and don't want thieves to know that they're being watched

I don't get this argument. The whole reason the fake security camera market exists is to deter crime by giving the illusion of being actively watched; if you want to play spy and switch it off to prove a person's true nature it is your business, but at the end of the day the crime has still been committed and your stuff is still gone

Indeed. And if someone have uninvited people in their home, I think they have bigger problems than the camera light...

I think it's a mix of people who like using their camera's to spy on family/guests/neighbors, and people who just genuinely do not know the camera works better as a deterrent then as evidence.

If this was an exterior camera, I would agree. But if someone is already in my home, I feel like them seeing the camera light isn't going to make them turn around and leave but it could lead to them destroying my camera and then I would lose evidence of their next moves.

Maybe the camera should contain a switch allowing me to choose which mode the LED should work in (on when being viewed, always off, or always on).

We have roommates who leave messes in the kitchen and blame others, have overnights guests more frequently than its allowed, etc.

Don't even get me started on the uses for kids.

Cameras are expensive, it is advertising your house is full of goodies.

No cameras must mean no goodies, then?

This doesn't follow. A camera is sufficient to demonstrate there exists value inside the house (value being subjective both the owner and the beholder in this case), but not necessary.

The camera inside my building is not for deterrence - the burglar is already inside at this point and will not be deterred. Either way, as you note, my stuff is gone. If their attention is drawn to an internal security camera by a light, then they may disable it or otherwise take extra steps to conceal themselves or avoid the camera. If they do not notice the camera, I may get better/more footage for identification purposes.

How many cameras do you pass each day that have a glowing/flashing indicator on them? None of the commercial cameras in my workplace or condo building have lights.

This change is extremely frustrating to me. I actually got valuable footage from my Dropcam Pro (now Nest) that I would not have recorded otherwise when someone was admitted to my apartment unsupervised in order to perform a task.

The Dropcam was on a shelf with a lot of other knickknacks and had a great view of my desk, living room and kitchen. The guy actually picked up the camera and called his accomplice over to look. Got a great image of both of them.

The light was off and they decided it was broken or not plugged in and put it back - where I then had a clear view of them collecting my personal documents, mail and financial records so they could take photographs for later use.

After searching, they found where I stored checks and credit cards that weren’t in use. They took random checks out of the checkbook and photographed the front and back of the card.

They then completed the work they’d been sent to do.

I noticed something was amiss when I came home, but nothing was obviously missing. Had I not had the video, the two would never have been arrested and convicted. Those responsible for admitting the duo would also likely have avoided their liability, having clear video of the incident allowed me to quickly resolve that claim (and effectively address the more than $200k in false charges, plus tax fraud, plus identity theft that resulted).

It's much easier to avoid and/or remove the camera if it's shining.

How about don't put Google surveillance cameras in your home? You don't "own" anything Google or Microsoft sells you. You are licensing their tech and you are their bitch when they decide to pull the rug out from under you. People tolerate such abusive, anti-consumer behavior and invasion of privacy all in the name of convenience. In any relationship people have an ethical responsibility to not enable abusive behavior (to the extent possible) -- this goes for people just as well as amoral corporations. So just don't fucking use their shit.

Indeed.

Basically, by buying this stuff, you're saving on having an actual engineer come out and install standard PoE cameras or similar. (A techie would do it themselves of course, most won't.)

The downside is that Google owns you.

Oops.

"The downside is that Google owns you."

I think it is more of a question of who/what the actual product is.

I talked to someone yesterday who didn't trust Amazon enough to use an Alexa device after the recent audio recording publicity.

Imagine their surprise when I let them know who owns their Ring doorbells and security cameras.

To be fair, Amazon only recently bought Ring (early 2018), and I recall the products being quite popular even before Amazon's acquisition. So really it may be the case of someone actively choosing not to buy a FAANG product, only to be sucked in later by Amazon's blackhole.

That's exactly what happened. Same deal for anyone with Eero mesh routers (Amazon) and Nest/DropCam (Google). It's impossible to avoid them in technology because they just buy everything.

Don't forget Amazon's Ring cameras!

Even on a lighter note, I'm getting more and more frustrated at cloud device providers changing features on a whim. For example, I own Nest products that I bought to integrated into my 'smart home'. Now Google is ripping out the API for Nest products and making us use Google Assistant. Google Assistant is repeatedly changing behaviors and breaking my workflow.

I understand I'm a tiny segment of the market, but it's hard not to want to switch over to fully owned, open source alternatives. Any suggestions?

Got the skills to build your own stuff (sensors, etc)?

Plenty of examples out there - plenty of instructables and other tutorial-like information to build these items.

For a camera - cheapest kit that I know of currently is what is called an "ESP32 Camera Module" (you can find them on Amazon, Ali Express, Ebay, etc) - something like a 5MP camera connected to an ESP32. Code, etc done up using (usually) Python.

Next cheapest - and easiest to implement and use - is a Raspberry Pi Zero W, a cheap RasPi camera module, and a copy of MotionEyeOS - note that'll make you a single IP camera. You can run MotionEyeOS on a more powerful system and have it monitor multiple cameras if you want. But the best system for that would by to build those same cameras using either the ESP32 solution, or MotionEyeOS, then turn on streaming mpeg for the camera, and use ZoneMinder on a powerful machine to monitor a larger number of cameras.

There are open source solutions (hardware and software) for controlling your thermostat (including zone-based AC), switching outlets on/off, watering your lawn, monitoring indoor/outdoor temperatures, plus tones of other possibilities.

A quick google search will bring up anything you want, but again, you will usually need to have some hardware and software chops to make it all work. The MotionEyeOS is probably the easiest thing to put together, as you are just taking a bunch of off-the-shelf components and assembling them, flashing the software and plugging it in.

The privacy of whom?

Google seems to favoring the privacy of those who might be recorded by the camera. The owners of the cameras object. I'm not entirely sure why: do they expect privacy while recording others?

I think that has to be it. I'm really surprised that people are objecting to having a "camera active" light.

You really aren't using your imagination if you can't figure out potential uses for a hidden nanny cam.

What if I want to see:

* If my cleaning person is stealing?

* If my cleaning person is using the right chemicals on my stove?

* If the nanny is shaking the baby?

* If my husband is having an affair?

* If my teenager is doing drugs?

* Which sibling actually started it / threw the first punch?

Those are just off the top of my head, I'm not even being creative.

> What if I want to see: If my cleaning person is stealing?*

Use your camera. The status light doesn’t disable its ability to record and transmit video. You want to record these people without their knowledge. That is just wrong.

More fundamentally, change the people you interact with or your relationships with them.

> That is just wrong.

I suppose it depends on what you mean by "wrong"?

For instance, it's perfectly legal to record inside your house - visibly or not - provided it's not in an area or place where the user would expect privacy (usually meaning a bathroom or similar place - but could be extended to bedrooms depending on consent and other reasons).

It might be considered unethical, perhaps even immoral, depending on the reasoning or ulimate purpose for those recordings. But legally there isn't anything wrong about it.

Note: This all depends on your local or other laws of course...

Unless you're hiring, marrying, and raising the dumbest people around, they're probably smart enough to not perform those activities in front of a video camera in any case.

Security cameras don't usually have indicator lights, so the safe assumption is always that the camera is recording.

Security cameras also don't always look like security cameras...but most (especially Nest devices) do. However, if I was trying to find out some kind of nefarious activity within my home, I wouldn't put up an obvious security camera, unless it was to redirect the potential perp toward somewhere that has the actual camera - hidden as a book, or something similar - ideally, it fits right in with its environment, and doesn't look at all out of placce...

Are you filming a reality show that depends on catching a cleaning person stealing, using the wrong chemicals, etc?

Or is the point to ensure your cleaning person is not stealing, using the wrong chemicals, etc?

The lights boost the purpose of deterrence, while making it harder to unethically record people. That's the point.

I would never have a Google-made camera in my house, and I really dislike defending them, but people who want a hidden cam need to hit up the nearest spy shop. Nest cams are for security, not "gotchas," and the always-on light serves security well.

Most people live with others in the same home, and more than one person can "own" a camera. Sometimes when no one else is home, privacy is expected of an otherwise shared space. I imagine in those circumstances, it can be comforting to know that the camera is actually off when you want it to be.

Which to me is saying that a burglar's right to know he's being recorded outweighs the property owner's right to catch burglars.

I don't really think the former should ever outweigh the latter.

Not hard to work around... open the device up, desolder or just cover up the LED? Or if you’re lazier, electrical tape on the exterior... Works for all kinds of annoyingly bright status LEDs!

maybe im too much of a consumer, but I bought a pack of led dimming stickers like the ones linked below to cover all the status lights on my computers and such cause I hate led lights in my house at night.

https://www.amazon.com/LightDims-Original-Strength-Electroni...

A black magic marker would work too.

Depends on how bright LED is

Nothing's going to get thru a black industrial sharpie; if that doesn't work, though, black fingernail polish, or if you don't mind the expense - black Testor's acrylic paint - will do the job.

Yeah real simple when it has a huge round circle of light https://cnet4.cbsistatic.com/img/rNMc3Qrlhua2ngFDHaVKbP53ZAU...

my concern is that people become conditioned to look for these lights, and draw the conclusion that light off = camera off. This is a bad precedent, as multiple built-in laptop webcam attacks to disable the led recording lights can attest to. If you need privacy, don't be in front of a camera or microphone. don't trust a clearly software controllable status light.

I'm glad I ditched all my nest stuff.

I'm pissed because the whole point of an outdoor camera is to not advertise when someone is watching. If they don't back pedal on this I'm switching to ubiquity and running my own NVR so I don't have to worry about someone in california deciding to change how a product I own works.

PoE cams and a solution like Zoneminder is like <$50 per camera to set up, assuming you have a home server, which I'd think most hackers would anyway.

>> is to not advertise when someone is watching.

Are you doing a Ph.D in social sciences?

Why the snarky comment? When you're outside or on my property you have no expectation of privacy.

Caution about "switching to ubiquity" - not that their product is bad or anything, but they take configuration of their stuff up several notches if you go with their commercial stuff (not sure about the home stuff).

I had considered switching my home wireless system to using Ubiquity APs and other equipment - then I looked into their configuration software. As someone who doesn't hold a Cisco cert or anything of that nature, some of it made me feel really, really stupid (they have a "demo" of their application on their site - to try out the software first). I'm sure it all has a point in a large-scale commercial deployment, but for a home system it seems like massive overkill, and I was concerned that using it and not setting it up properly might lead me to misconfiguring it and opening my network up worse than without using it...

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