Eufy “no cloud” security cameras streaming data to the cloud
Article by Christopher Boyd of Malwarebytes
Eufy home security cameras are currently in a spot of trouble as a result of door camera footage. This is because it turns out that data which should not have been going to the cloud was doing so anyway in certain conditions.
Securing your home: a complicated proposition
Insecure cameras, unprotected cloud footage, streams going where they shouldn’t be: these are all areas for concern when looking into buying a home security system. Maybe you want full CCTV across the property. Perhaps you want alarms tied to cameras, or just a doorbell cam to see who’s popping in during the day.
In all of these cases, potential buyers need to find the answers to just some of the following questions:
- Is the device internet connected?
- Can you access feeds from outside your home, and if so, how?
- Is the footage password protected? Is the device password protected?
- If we’re talking storage, is data written to a local drive, or are cloud services available? Is the cloud offering bespoke, or can you hook up the device to a cloud provider of your choosing?
- Is the footage encrypted? Is audio recorded? How long is any of this stored for, and under what conditions?
- If there’s an app, how secure is it?
- When there’s a service outage, are the devices rendered inoperable?
It’s not just a case of buying some random cameras and bolting them to the side of your house. There’s a lot to consider, and even then, something can happen to catch you completely unaware…as we’re about to find out.
When “local” means “also some cloud”
Many folks would err on the side of caution where cameras are concerned, choosing not to go down the road of internet connectivity or footage being placed in the cloud. Now, security researcher Paul Moore has discovered that a system he chose for those reasons was in fact placing data in the cloud anyway.
This article appeared first at Malwarebytes Labs on Dec 5, 2022.
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