Dashcam Flaw Allows Anyone To Track Drivers In Real-Time Across the US (vice.com) 23
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: BlackVue is a dashcam company with its own social network. With a small, internet-connected dashcam installed inside their vehicle, BlackVue users can receive alerts when their camera detects an unusual event such as someone colliding with their parked car. Customers can also allow others to tune into their camera's feed, letting others "vicariously experience the excitement and pleasure of driving all over the world," a message displayed inside the app reads. Users are invited to upload footage of their BlackVue camera spotting people crashing into their cars or other mishaps with the #CaughtOnBlackVue hashtag. But what BlackVue's app doesn't make clear is that it is possible to pull and store users' GPS locations in real-time over days or even weeks. Motherboard was able to track the movements of some of BlackVue's customers in the United States.
Ordinarily, BlackVue lets anyone create an account and then view a map of cameras that are broadcasting their location and live feed. This broadcasting is not enabled by default, and users have to select the option to do so when setting up or configuring their own camera. Motherboard tuned into live feeds from users in Hong Kong, China, Russia, the U.K, Germany, and elsewhere. BlackVue spokesperson Jeremie Sinic told Motherboard in an email that the users on the map only represent a tiny fraction of BlackVue's overall customers. But the actual GPS data that drives the map is available and publicly accessible. By reverse engineering the iOS version of the BlackVue app, Motherboard was able to write scripts that pull the GPS location of BlackVue users over a week long period and store the coordinates and other information like the user's unique identifier. One script could collect the location data of every BlackVue user who had mapping enabled on the eastern half of the United States every two minutes. Motherboard collected data on dozens of customers. Following the report, BlackVue said their developers "have updated the security measures" to prevent this sort of tracking.
Motherboard confirmed that previously provided user data stopped working, and they said they have "deleted all of the data collected to preserve individuals' privacy."
Ordinarily, BlackVue lets anyone create an account and then view a map of cameras that are broadcasting their location and live feed. This broadcasting is not enabled by default, and users have to select the option to do so when setting up or configuring their own camera. Motherboard tuned into live feeds from users in Hong Kong, China, Russia, the U.K, Germany, and elsewhere. BlackVue spokesperson Jeremie Sinic told Motherboard in an email that the users on the map only represent a tiny fraction of BlackVue's overall customers. But the actual GPS data that drives the map is available and publicly accessible. By reverse engineering the iOS version of the BlackVue app, Motherboard was able to write scripts that pull the GPS location of BlackVue users over a week long period and store the coordinates and other information like the user's unique identifier. One script could collect the location data of every BlackVue user who had mapping enabled on the eastern half of the United States every two minutes. Motherboard collected data on dozens of customers. Following the report, BlackVue said their developers "have updated the security measures" to prevent this sort of tracking.
Motherboard confirmed that previously provided user data stopped working, and they said they have "deleted all of the data collected to preserve individuals' privacy."
correction (Score:1)
Dashcam 2.0 (Score:5, Interesting)
I was postulating some of the likely features of the next generation of dashcams just the other day and continuous reporting of your driving to your insurance company. They will include automatic number plate recognition and other bad drivers will black-flagged automatically to their insurance companies, so refusing one will make no difference. It will be China's social credit system privatised for profit.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
This already exists.
Insurance companies in the UK offer you a discount if you have a black box that records your driving and reports and bad behaviour to them. They don't work very well, for example if you have a little Fiat 500 it thinks you are accelerating really hard all the time because you have to floor it to make the little under-powered engine go up the slightest incline or merge into traffic. Another common error is when you have two roads nearby with different speed limits, and it thinks you are o
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and bad drivers will black-flagged automatically to their insurance companies,
You say it like it is a bad thing. If high insurance gets the asshole of the road, I'm all for it. No expectation of privacy on the road anyway.
Whats this now? (Score:2)
Obscure no-name brands from china have questionable security?
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One of the more popular name-brand dashcams from a Korean company doesn't sound like a no-name brand from China. I guess Samsung is a no-name Chinese brand as well.
I probable should have read the article instead of making assumptions.
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They're one of the higher end dashcams. What's more this function was optional (and even told you that it would make that possible) when I set mine up 3 years ago.
This has come up every few months for years, and every time it follows the same pattern - The users turned it on, didn't read the warnings and didn't turn it back off, then people freaked out that it did exactly what that option said it would do.
I can watch other people drive around? (Score:2)
I can't stand driving to begin with. Why the hell do I want to see someone drive to McDonald's?
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Re:I can watch other people drive around? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not about tracking everyone or random people to see general movement, but if you can track lots, you can pick out a car of interest, and track that one car secretly.
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So? (Score:1)
That's no problem, they don't have anything to hide!
It's a brave new feature, really.
Who's paying for the internet connection? (Score:3)
Where does the internet connection come from? Is there a SIM card and antenna in the camera? Does it rely on cell phone wifi hot spot?
More importantly, who in their right mind would go out of their way to pay for an internet connection just to participate in dashcam social media? Is an internet connection required? If not, I would just use it with no network connection.
Configuration (Score:1)