Malware can turn off webcam LED and record video, demonstrated on ThinkPad X230

Re:Malware can turn off webcam LED and record video, demonst... by ComputerGuru on Thursday November 28, 2024 @10:23AM (#42265846)

Cameras are now always on, to reduce the latency to taking a picture or scrubbing video feed. You’d need to wire the led to something tied to the data lines, perhaps.

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Re:Malware can turn off webcam LED and record video, demonst... by vanilla_nut on Thursday November 28, 2024 @10:38AM (#42265990)

Source? This seems extremely unlikely to me, running a camera all the time consumes a fair bit of energy and they don't take long to turn on. Unless that's because they're always on?

Regardless, that's a pretty strong claim. I'd love to learn more if you have a link that can back you up!

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Re:Malware can turn off webcam LED and record video, demonst... by gtirloni on Thursday November 28, 2024 @10:35AM (#42265963)

Any links you could share abouy someone confirming this?

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Re:Malware can turn off webcam LED and record video, demonst... by ewoodrich on Thursday November 28, 2024 @01:27PM (#42267501)

My M1 Macbook has some pretty extreme latency going from opening Photobooth black screen -> displayed image. Roughly five seconds to useable image.

  :00 Photobooth window open 
  :03 Camera LED lights up 
  :05 First image displayed

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Re:Malware can turn off webcam LED and record video, demonst... by saagarjha on Sunday December 01, 2024 @08:00AM (#42288236)

That's generally not the case. Keeping the camera on requires power and processing its video stream is resource-intensive.

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