The most effective way would be use a Thermal Camera, because a normal "hidden camera" you get from eBay will consume around 5 Watts - a significant heat dissipation.
For others, probably just get an off the shelf TinySA?
Another way to detect hidden cameras is optical augmentation, using reflections to locate lenses; this can detect cameras that aren't currently on / actively transmitting.
Look for "bug detector" on eBay, there are lots of RF and optical camera detectors and they are fairly cheap. They work, at least so far as detecting steady streams of WiFi data, and cellphone transmissions, I've tried a couple of them:
The optical camera detectors work based on a simple idea, red LED's are used to create a circular pattern of light and you look through a red filter at your space. A camera lens is concave and symmetric so it reflects the LED's in the same circular pattern. Blink the LED's. Look through the red filter and scan around the room. Anything that reflects a discernable circular blinking LED pattern is a lens or lens like. Basically it makes it easy to see everything that reflects light symmetrically back at you. Move around a little and anything with a lens will stand out. It only works with fairly large lenses though, a pinhole camera would not be detectable.
Their RF detectors have adjustable sensitivity and indicate amplitude of the signal. Good enough to track the transmissions back to the source, though they don't provide any frequency information. Range is somewhat limited so you have to move around a room to scan it.
TinySA works well for detecting RF sources also. I don't know what the exact update rate is but the one I have seems to update at least a few times per second. It's a little tedious to use, the RF spectrum is big and you'll find quite a few spikes from sources in it and you have to zoom in on each one to get the exact frequency and observe how it behaves (or maybe there is a way to select a peak of interest? I haven't played with it much.) You'll find FM radio stations, cellular communications, cordless phones, and lots more.
Most people are not going to be finding surveillance bugs in their homes or offices. However these things are useful for understanding what your RF environment is like or troubleshooting RF devices. Might be good for telling if your smart appliance is spying on you, for example if the detector beeps every time you change channels on your TV.
That camera detector is pretty pricey; I once saw a low-tech solution that was basically a dyed card that you had to put in front of your phone camera with the light on, the light reflected by the camera lens would become very visible.
Of course, only a matter of time - if they don't already exist - before there's cheap spy cameras without a reflecting lens, like a solid state camera of sorts. I believe some years ago they were experimenting with that as an alternative to a front facing camera on phones.
garblegarble|1 year ago
Some paper and product references:
- (PDF) http://s3.amazonaws.com/arena-attachments/1381379/c3a4e75132...
- https://www.spycatcheronline.co.uk/product/camera-detector/
- https://www.ijser.org/paper/Lens-Detection-System-using-Opti...
- https://patents.google.com/patent/US20090237668A1/en
rapjr9|1 year ago
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p4432023.m...
The optical camera detectors work based on a simple idea, red LED's are used to create a circular pattern of light and you look through a red filter at your space. A camera lens is concave and symmetric so it reflects the LED's in the same circular pattern. Blink the LED's. Look through the red filter and scan around the room. Anything that reflects a discernable circular blinking LED pattern is a lens or lens like. Basically it makes it easy to see everything that reflects light symmetrically back at you. Move around a little and anything with a lens will stand out. It only works with fairly large lenses though, a pinhole camera would not be detectable.
Their RF detectors have adjustable sensitivity and indicate amplitude of the signal. Good enough to track the transmissions back to the source, though they don't provide any frequency information. Range is somewhat limited so you have to move around a room to scan it.
TinySA works well for detecting RF sources also. I don't know what the exact update rate is but the one I have seems to update at least a few times per second. It's a little tedious to use, the RF spectrum is big and you'll find quite a few spikes from sources in it and you have to zoom in on each one to get the exact frequency and observe how it behaves (or maybe there is a way to select a peak of interest? I haven't played with it much.) You'll find FM radio stations, cellular communications, cordless phones, and lots more.
Most people are not going to be finding surveillance bugs in their homes or offices. However these things are useful for understanding what your RF environment is like or troubleshooting RF devices. Might be good for telling if your smart appliance is spying on you, for example if the detector beeps every time you change channels on your TV.
Cthulhu_|1 year ago
Of course, only a matter of time - if they don't already exist - before there's cheap spy cameras without a reflecting lens, like a solid state camera of sorts. I believe some years ago they were experimenting with that as an alternative to a front facing camera on phones.
RamboRogers|1 year ago
I made a thermal camera https://github.com/RamboRogers/M5StickCPlus2-AMG8833-Thermal...
blincoln|1 year ago
https://www.beneaththewaves.net/Photography/Images/Thermal_I...
When I travel, I use mine to sweep the room.
transpute|1 year ago
What's the frequency range and scanning speed of TinySA?