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Comment by smegsicle | Hacker News Reader

> leaking nude photos from someone's camera

whatever happened to that meme about common ccd cameras picking up uv images that make out details through eg swimsuits, but hopefully filtered and removed in software before making it to the images?

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Cameras usually include an infrared filter (also called a "hot mirror" or "IR cut") that reflects infrared radiation. Mostly because not blocking IR leads to wrong colours for scenes like sunsets where a disproportionate amount of IR radiation is there.

Many smartphones (used to?) exclude this filter on the selfie-camera because no matter how hot you think you might be, it's not going to be an issue.

If you want to check an IR remote for function, try with the selfie camera of your phone and not the normal one and make sure you are trying in a dark environment because the LED on the remote is going to be rather dim either way.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_mirror

As an aside, the IR filter is often removed[0] from many cameras when using them for astrophotography. Canon[1] sell dedicated astro cameras that are modified in this way, along with other modifications.

[0] - https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-blogs/imaging-foundati... [1] - https://www.canon.co.uk/cameras/eos-ra/

I recall the panic over that back in in the day, IIRC it was near-visible infra-red, not UV - if you didn't have sufficient IR filtering over the sensor, were using flash (and the flash included a decent amount of IR), and the subject was wearing something thin, you'd potentially get unintended skin detail with the IR reflection.

As I understand more or less a solved problem on modern cameras such as on your smartphone... instead of a bulb you tend to have white LED for your flash that doesn't really give off useful (any?) IR, and there's better/more consistent IR filtering on the sensor.

I still have a Sony CD camera (as in disk not ccd) which has near IR and a IR led. Fun to play with for night recording (its intended use) and you can see though thin clothes a tiny bit but range is very limited. Skin patterns much less due to lacking contrast. Resolution in that mode is also lacking so detail is not really a thing. I can understand the problem and I think that is the reason my IR camera in my laptop has a moire pattern in the hardware to make it almost useless to the common eye. But that last part is just a guess.

Sony was forced to cripple the "night vision" feature of some cameras because it was too easy to abuse to see through clothing.

it’s likely this was actually infrared imaging capabilities

https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/15/21259723/oneplus-8-pro-x-...

UV or IR?

If it’s IR… I have a PVS-14, I’ll have to dig one of my wife’s swimsuits out of the closet and see if it’s transparent. I’m curious.

Those camera manufacturers quickly eliminated that capability, likely via optical filtering. That was about 20 years ago. Consumer-grade cameras do not have that ability nowadays (bad publicity).

Why not just fix the swimsuits? Seems like a much more straightforward solution.

The problem was not swimsuits. It was any clothing that was relatively thin. Swimsuits was just an example.

In any case why would we be required to don tinfoil suits every time we go to the airport?

I mean, the material has a bug that wasn't discovered until recently, so we fix the bug and re-deploy the material. It's that simple. Just embed some carbon fibers or something in the swim suit, there are tons of ways to block UV.

It's like if your car seatbelts have a bug you issue a product recall. Same thing.

Or just add a near infrared filter to cameras. Much easier and can even be mandated by law if necessary.

No. I can rip off infrared filters from any camera I own.

I already do that, because I image nebulae and galaxies and sometimes landscapes in infrared.

Most people cannot, believe that they cannot, or would not even if they could. We can be sure of that because despite of billions of cameras in phones, pocket cameras or webcams being out there, the web is not flooded by pictures like these. Putting filters into cameras definitely works. It is not an obstacle to the determined but it prevents most of the abuse most of the time.

You do realise that you have to add this to every swimsuit on the planet, right? And all other clothes that may exhibit it this behaviour?

It is not the material that’s buggy, it’s new technology which can look under clothes and damage privacy that’s the problem.

Not to mention changing materials would likely have continuous costs, and will impact the materials properties and longevity - potentially in ways that just don't add up to a feasible product.

And then there's the fact that this is a hugely international business, so unless we convince the whole world to do this, we'll be impacting supply lines and flexibility there too.

The whole undertaking seems like it would have an absurd scope - just to avoid adding IR filters that cameras need anyhow to achieve accurate color reproduction, and therefore most cameras already include!

No. That's like saying thieves are the problem so tie up the hands of every would-be thief and don't bother lock doors.

It's much simpler to lock doors, and that prevents thieves 99.9% of the time.

The filter IS the lock. It can be circumvented by the determined but it prevents most of the abuse most of the time.

It would seem easier and more efficient to fix the cultural taboos around nudity and over-sexualisation.

Breastfeeding mothers would be collateral winners of that change for example.

Hardware deployment is order of magnitudes more costly than software.

50/50 on privacy. Sure, privacy is cool but I pity the people whom must endure seeing the shapely flabs and curves of everyday people. That's got to have a toll on anyone's psych over time, as an "occupational hazard".

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