Even better is a hardware kill switch, especially for the mic.

Librem Purism labtop has hadware kill switches.

I managed to unplug the mic in my Thinkpad and my Dell XPS laptop with about 5min of work for each. It's still possible to do at the moment if you don't mind relying on plugging in headphones w/ a mic to use one.

Of course a switch would be nice, similar to the older Thinkpads which had a hardware switch for the network devices on the front, originally for use on airplanes.

> I managed to unplug the mic in my Thinkpad

Any chance you documented the procedure or have links to relevant documentation?

For Thinkpads the documentation you're looking for is the "Hardware Maintenance Manual" (HMM). E.g. here is one for the X260, it clearly describes where the camera/microphone assembly is, how to get to it and where its wire connections go: https://ok2.de/ThinkPad/HMM/x260_hmm_en_sp40j72016.pdf I haven't taken apart one of the more Ultrabook-style ones, so not sure how accessible those are, but the traditional ones are very serviceable.

I wouldn't be surprised if the better Dell models have similar documentation available.

This is easy in almost all laptops: the microphone is attached to the mobo via a 2-wire tiny plug. Disassemble your laptop, look at the other side of the keyboard pane, a bit away from the speakers. Some laptops might also carry mikes in the screen bezel or multiple mikes, so check all cables that go away from the mobo.

But now you have to trust the switch to really deactivate the mic. I'm a recursive paranoiac !

The usual* way to handle this is to have a small LED next to the mic/camera that shows when it's on -- and have it wired up to the device in series, such that it's software-impossible for the device to be powered without the light being on.

*: it's what we did on the One Laptop Per Child laptop, and I'm sure others have too.

Thank you for inventing the netbook and showing the ODMs how to make low cost PC notebooks.

Any idea where to get a CLI-from-boot notebook for teaching kids programming and encouraging a hacker ethic?

Thanks for the kind words! I haven't used it personally, but a programmer in my Twitter feed recommended this one that they've been using with their kids recently. (I don't think there's a heavy emphasis on CLI.)

https://tksstgiftguide.tumblr.com/post/167274832422/our-kids...

At least you only need to verify a switch once, it won't be compromised by software changes.

Assuming the switch does really cut the mic signal and doesn't instead act on a i/o pin which calls a function to disable the mic input. The second solution would be hackable.

That's a very good point. We have it for wifi already, so...

I 3d-printed a crude shutter and super-glued it to the bezel: https://youtube.com/watch?v=oOkPP_5bjhs

I think it would be about as easy to make a cardboard one.

Indeed they do. The security team at my work ordered hundreds of them and hand them out to anyone that asks. They even have the company logo on them.

There's been a Kickstarter called Nope for cams for a few years now, they exceeded funding by a large multiple each time. I got the second version a year ago, they are now on version 3 and added a headphone jack blocker.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bungajungle/nope-sound-...

Not really sure about the headphone jack blocker; I'm not aware of an OS where the sound source can't be trivially switched in software, even when headphones are plugged in.

The likelihood is that if an attacker has the ability to record audio, they also have the ability to bypass this device.

My Asus EEEPC has one.

C-slide dot com, the iPad one (round with a pivot) is my favourite

Indeed, bags of lens stick on lens covers (that allow you to open when you need the camera) is a product idea I thought of ages ago, but too lazy to actually do.

it exists already, got one as swag at a conference from Nvidia (???). strange gift, I like the sentiment though.

Yes, got mine as a swag too (not Nvidia), works perfectly. Can be found by looking for "webcam cover slider" on Amazon or I assume any web store that deals with such things.