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Overcome the surveillance camera hacking loophole

There has been much media attention and news reports recently on surveillance cameras being easily invaded by hackers (see http://goo.gl/mVz0hS for example). With the obtained video data and images, some have been uploaded to the Internet and are available to Web browsers. This is a serious issue, which can cause harm to public safety and privacy.

In theory any device linked to the Internet is susceptible to the risks of hackers’ attacks. This is particularly true for IP cameras, as they are designed to support open standards. Hackers are able to attack H.264 IP cameras through the Open Systems Services such as HTTP, RTSP, FTP which are commonly embedded in the cameras. By sending suitable open systems protocol commands to a H.264 IP camera or by capturing and analysing its open systems data streams, hackers can bypass the security of the camera and have access to live video footages remotely.

As you can imagine this would be a huge problem for industries that have to deal with classified information and highly confidential data on a daily basis, such as government and public sectors and banks. It is common to install CCTV cameras within offices, not only to monitor for suspicious activities but to also protect staff and the individuals of the data that they may be dealing with.

Dr. Wallace Ma, chief marketing officer of TeleEye Group.

TeleEye has developed its own anti-hacking technology to close off any hacking loopholes. “TeleEye Hacker Resistant Technology comprises five layers of protection which is incorporated to the wide spectrum of TeleEye products,” states Dr. Wallace Ma, chief marketing officer of TeleEye.

The five layers

• Secured protocol – A set of special video streaming protocols is enabling to provide extra security during internal transmission.

• AES256 encryption – A higher-level encryption is adopted by the US government to protect top secret information.

• Pair matching architecture – TeleEye gives special identity to restrict any unauthorised access.

• IP filtering – Allow only designated IP address to access the cameras.

• Proprietary video coder – Hacker cannot recognise the video stream at all.

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