Is Your Baby Monitor Safe?

As if new parents didn’t have enough to worry about, now they have to worry about hackers taking over their baby monitors.  In August of 2013, Marc Gilbert, a father in Texas ran to his daughter Allyson’s room when he heard a voice saying, “Wake up, you little slut”.  When he got to the room, he realized that someone hacked the baby monitor, took control of the camera and was watching his little girl.  When he went to unplug the camera, he watched as it turned to see what he was doing.  Little Allyson slept through the incident, but Mr. Gilbert made sure that he had tighter security and firewalls installed on both the monitor and his Internet.

The baby monitor used by the Gilberts was made by Foscam and connected to the Internet.  This particular monitor was known to have security issues, but since they didn’t buy the monitor directly from Foscam, they never received the company’s email regarding an available update that corrected the problem.  As of today, there are estimated to be another 40,000 monitors that can still be hacked.

Just recently, a hacker found one of those monitors in Cincinnati, Ohio.

In April 2014, Adam and Heather Schreck woke up to the sound of someone yelling, “Wake up, baby!”, coming from their 10 month old daughter’s room.  The parents rushed to the room and were horrified when they realized the voice was coming from their baby monitor!  The monitor’s camera started moving and pointed right at them while the person on the other end of the monitor continued to yell obscenities at them and the baby. 

 

This could be the same person who hacked the Gilbert’s baby monitor in Texas or it could be a copycat, but they will never know.  In order to remove the threat, the Schrecks quickly unplugged the baby monitor.  Marc Gilbert also unplugged his daughter’s monitor.  Unfortunately, by doing this, all information stored in the monitor, including the log of IP addresses that accessed it, are erased, making it impossible for the police to trace who is responsible.

The Importance of Parental Supervision

This article is a bit different from most of the Internet privacy articles in this blog, however, a particular news story prompted me to write this (Utah Mom’s Facebook Check May Have Saved Son From Shooting Plot).  The article appeared on The Huffington Post site on April 8, 2014.   While many parents are realizing the importance of supervising and monitoring their kids when they go on the Internet, there are still many parents who don’t see the point of this.

Obviously, one parent in Salt Lake City, Utah is thankful that she chose to monitor her son’s social media.  If she didn’t do this, she, and possibly many other parents, would be mourning the loss of their kids.   The mom, who was not identified, saw threats made to her son on his Facebook page and called police.  When police went to the school, they found two teens sitting in a car near the targeted victim’s high school.  In the car, they found a gun, a loaded magazine, marijuana and a bong.  The two were immediately arrested. 

Another trend developing are kids going to answer sites asking how they can get away with having social media behind their parents’ backs.  In order to have a social media account, a child must be at least 13 years old.  We already know that some parents help their younger kids open accounts, but there are some who don’t feel their kids are mature enough at 13, so they won’t allow it.  Some parents will monitor their kids’ social media and will take it away because they have seen posts they don’t approve of.  Here is an example of the types of questions being asked (this particular example was found on Yahoo Answers) by the kids whose parents either won’t allow it, or have taken it away because of inappropriate, on-line behavior:

I want my Facebook account back?

Ok so I am 14 and my dad has confiscated my Facebook account because of a past incident and I have understood my mistake but he won't give me my password.  I really want to add kids from my school.

Update 1: No need for anymore answer because i am making a new one and i doubt my dad would find that out unless i tell him that i would not tell so soon.

Here is the answer that the 14 year old chose as the Best Answer:

I see your update, but have to answer.

This is not a very smart idea. As a 14 year old, I know you think parents are stupid, but they aren't. Your dad will find out about the other account and then you will not only lose Facebook, but you will lose other privileges as well. You will no longer be trusted.

You don't say how long your dad has been holding your FB hostage, but you need to give him some time while you show him you can be responsible. He didn't delete your account, so he is going to give it back, you're just "grounded" from FB for a while. Sneaking around isn't helping your case. In fact, it's hurting it.

You need to have an open discussion with your dad and show him that you realize your mistake. You could also go over the linked article and check out the guidelines. Discuss them with your dad and see what the two of you can come up with as a compromise so he will allow you to access your account again.

But, if this just happened, you could wait a while before adding people. It seems that you really learned nothing from all this.

Voice of reason, right?  Well, the 14 year old made this comment after choosing this answer:

The Invasion of “Cyber-Bullies”

Bullies have been around for decades.  Before the Internet, bullying was limited to the school yard or neighborhoods.   The victim was confronted by the bully and a group of his or her friends and taunted.  A lot of times, after the last school bell rang, the taunting became physical and the victim was beaten up.  The reasons for the bullying were varied.  Maybe the victim was from a poor family and couldn’t afford all the newest clothes.  It could have been because a child wore glasses, or braces, or had freckles.  It could even have been because the teacher singled out one child to always help pass out test papers or to answer questions in class.  Whatever the so-called reason was, bullies were an ever-present threat to the happy childhood of many kids.  Today is no different except that in this age of technology, most of the bullying happens over the Internet.  Welcome to the age of the cyber-bully.

Bullying is no longer confined to the school yard or the neighborhoods.  Now, a cyber-bully can hide behind a computer and remain nameless and faceless.  The attacks no longer happen just at school; they are carried out over Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.  Since most kids today have cell phones that also take really good pictures, it’s easy for one to snap an unflattering picture of a classmate and send it over the Internet for all to see.  Captions are added to make the pictures even more humiliating.  In the movie “Mean Girls”, the group of “cool girls” had a “burn book” with photos and comments about those they hated.  Today, that “burn book” is a Facebook page made for the sole purpose of hurting others.

During the last few weeks, I have seen quite a few stories on the news about kids, some as young as 10, killing themselves because they were cyber-bullied.  Why?  Because some nameless, faceless cowards started rumors about them online, or posted pictures of them that they were embarrassed by.  And, yes, these cyber-bullies are cowards.  They don’t have the nerve to say something face to face, but behind a computer screen, they’re brave.  A very unnerving facet of all this is that the cyber-bully could be the victims best friend in real life; the friend that he or she confides in and who pretends to give support. 

   

Parents need to talk to their kids about this issue.  Kids need to understand that what happens online is unimportant.  What’s important is real life.  Those who know you know what is true and what is false.  The kids also need to know that they have to confide in a parent or teacher if they find themselves in a cyber-bullying situation.  How many lives could have been saved if these kids knew they could talk to someone about what they were going through?  The schools need to be made aware of any instances of cyber-bullying.  In some cases, the police should get involved.  If things get out of hand, the police will be able to track down a cyber-bully.

Above all, the victims of cyber-bullying need to know that suicide is never the answer.  It may seem like all is hopeless, but it’s not.  Dear Abby once said that suicide is “a permanent solution to a temporary problem”.  This is so true.  Parents should monitor their kids’ social media pages.  They can’t let this go on until it’s too late.  Let your kids know not to give a cyber-bully the power to control their lives.  Cyber-bullies and real life bullies truly are just cowards who act tough to appear brave.  The only way to stop them is to take a stand and show them that their words can’t hurt you.  Hold your head up high and don’t listen to the whispered comments or read their hate on social media.  If everyone took a stand against these bullies, they would continue to move on to the next victim and the next until they realize that no one cares what they have to say.  It’s up to the parents to teach their kids the art of ignoring.

We all want our kids to be safe.  Please take a few minutes to download the free Privacy Guide located at the top of this page.  It will give suggestions and tips on how to stay safe in many online and off line situations.