internet security cameras

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BULLSI

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Anyone have opinions on these cameras that you can check out your property over the internet.

There was a breakin across the street yesterday so it is time to upgrade my security cameras. I'm a big fan of security cameras around here I have 8 that record to a vcr but those dont have the greatest picture quality and only record when there is movement. I even have one inside my house. You basically cant walk on my property and not get caught on tape.

A few reasons that I think I havent had a breakin yet (and I feel that someday they will try it here) is I have a dog that is a great barker (only barks at something/someone and not shadows) an adt sign in the front yard and security stickers on all my windows and my cameras. Everyone that lived on my street a year ago know I have cameras because of an incident that was in the local news, plus my tenants big mouth. So it is out there that I have those even though I tried to keep it on the hush hush.

So I want to go digital. Wireless. And have audio. With maybe four extra cameras of high quality picture resolution. Pan tilt zoom on at least one of the cameras. I want to record 24/7. Would like to record offsite if possible or on a seperate hardrive that would be hidden on property here. And I want to be able to check out my property over the internet when I am away.

Anyone know, use this kind of system. I researched a camera system yesterday made by Dlink and like some of those. Any make sure you get - etc thoughts on this. TIA
 
I think that this camera with the 802.11g you can access your camera with just an internet conection and a router. Your computor doesnt even need to be on. Yet I will have some sort of device on that records. At least that is want I think I am reading. Need to do more research as this is a new area for me.

http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=342#

And was thinking of these for the other cameras. these dont have the pan tilt zoom features.

http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=664
 
I am not sure, but I think the 802.11 feature of the camera is used to eliminate the need to hard wire the cameras to your network. I believe you still need a PC to control all of this. To be really secure, you should put your computer on a fairly robust UPS so it will continue to work if you lose power either accidentally or if the "BG" cuts your power. You might also want to consider getting one of those broadband devices so that computer can stay online in the event you also lose your telephone or cable service. As far as storage, I recently bought a 1tb drive for $80! Theoretically, at maximum resolution, it will hold 242 hours (over 10 days) of "standard quality" video or 95 hours (a little less than 3 days) of HD video.

You can go to BestBuy and get a cheap PC and UPS, put in 1 or or even 2tb hard drive, and sign up for broadband Internet service and you should be good to go. Whatever you do, stay away from Wal Mart! We all know that is the most dangerous place for gun owners since just about every thread in the Strategies and Tactics forum involves them in some form or another!

Scott
 
Please consider the difference between "security" and "surveillance".

"Security" cameras are monitored 24/7/365 by someone that can take some immediate action to intercede in an active crime.

"Surveillance" cameras take pictures in the "hope" they can help catch who commuted the crime ... but provide -no- security.

Good strong doors and locks, good lighting, making OTHER places an easier target than yours, and "the barky dog" bests either of the two above every time.
 
I relly want a few that are pan tilt zoom a IR and low light feature. That tech has not come into my price range yet.
 
There is some good advice here. I have a 5 camera system that can be viewed and reviewed over the net. It is PC based.
The best low light cameras I have found are these.
http://www.supercircuits.com/Security-Cameras/Fixed-Security-Cameras/PC164CEX-2

Here are a couple of vids taken with these cameras and cheap lenses. Just select from the thumbnails on the left to view the others.

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You select a lense to work for your area to be monitored auto iris and such.
If the mounting area can accept a larger footprint device there are pan and tilt mounts very cheap and most PC based DVR surveillance systems have a app to operate PTZ included. Zoom is still expensive due to lense cost.
As was mentioned video needs to be supported with traditional methods to restrict access. The PD evidence vaults are filled with videos of crimes where the perp did not present their ID to the camera before exit and nobody knows who they are. At the above vid site you can see a good pic of a person who tried to get in here but nobody in the hood or at the PD know who he is.
Most full feature systems will be PC based. You need lots of cameras and motion record so a PC is easy. The base computer is cheap and the software is expensive. You want 30fps dvr record for 8 cameras it cost.
 
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There are some great systems out there. I was looking a while back for a cabin and some systems can process the image for motion and if motion is detected, it will send an e-mail and can even include an image and then start recording.

The IP cameras can just be routed through the router or switch and don't need to connect to a computer. For the lower priced ones though, the image quality is not that great.

I would need dsl for the cabin though which adds up in $ over an entire year.
 
I don't have any information on this sort of thing, just a few things to consider.

I've seen some motion detectors that plug into your phone lines and dial your cell phone when there is motion inside the house. Don't know much about them, but I think some even come with cameras.

Even if you choose to go with the cameras that go over the internet, make sure it records at your house. Then make sure that this recording device is protected. If I were robbing a house with security cameras, I'd take the cameras if they were nice, and the vcr too. Maybe if you could find a way for it to be in your gun safe?


Another option is to use game cameras, some of them take incredible pictures at night.
 
I have a fileserver in my closet that's on a 1hr battery backup that I keep a few very discreet webcams hooked up to. The fileserver can be reached through a roundabout communication with a access server that's on my home network's DMZ. I'm a computer geek by trade, thus I have all this crap anyways....you have to practice what you preach and all that. :)

In the event of an intrusion I can monitor the living room, kitchen and hallway from my laptop in my bedroom, or to keep tabs on the place remotely.

Knowing where they are is the difference between an "if moment" and a "will moment". I can see if there's a firearm in their hands, what they are doing, etc. That's as close to total control one can get in this situation....and is priceless.

It's also fun seeing what the dog is up to when nobody's watching....caught him chewing on my boots by the door again....bad dog! :p

(edit: decided I dug too far into my place's security, removed "exploitable" information)
 
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How long does it take you to access that video feed? Is it something that you keep running, you can just flip it open? Or do you have to waste precious time screwing around before you know what's happening?
 
How long does it take you to access that video feed? Is it something that you keep running, you can just flip it open? Or do you have to waste precious time screwing around before you know what's happening?
Click to expand...

On my system it takes a minute to access the digital system over the home network. That is why I have a hot video feed, of the multicam screen, in each room and on both TVs, they can be fast to access. When I want to monitor the system full time I can make it picture in picture when watching the race or news or have a small corner of the computer monitor showing the system while I am on the computer. Small LCD video monitors come on instantly, don't need any input from me no booting up, only have a single use so are always in the right spot and ready, are cheap and don't light the room up to bother others. So I think a system should have a video and digital side each has its own advantages. :)
 
I deleted the part about the setup of it, but I have a laptop on standby next to my bed....takes 15 seconds to go from standby to feed streaming. I just keep my pistol trained on the door while it's coming up.

There's a heavy dose of security on it. the odds of inappropriate access is very slim.
 
Hi,

Like some who posted here, I do IT for a living, and have helped folks setup budget based systems. A few things to consider:

1) camera considerations: Power over Ethernet (PoE) is king. Wifi is not as reliable as wired, even with static IP on the camera and avoiding channel interference with neighbors - heck, a strong microwave oven going on/off near your wifi cam can cause a signal drop. PoE means you power the cameras from the ethernet (network) cable, saving electrician costs and giving you lots of flexibility where you place the cameras. and PoE means they will stay on even with the power out, as long as your battery/ups has the juice. A PoE switch can set you back if you don't have a lot of cameras to power - consider a $49 power injector (not the 2 sided dlink ones) but a one sided "802.11af standards" one, put it or the PoE switch on the same ups as your server/pc and you're good to go.

2) feature config: PoE is not wifi (you can't yet send power over the air :) ) and waterproof/outdoor usually not wifi. So think PoE/wired then decide if you want outdoor or indoor and if you want night-vision (where the cam illuminates). Pan Tilt Zoom (ptz) adds a lot of cost, make sure you need it.

3) in the "not expensive" end, the software i've found to be good is www.blueirissoftware.com . for the following reasons:
a) you can use it, and be camera agnositc, vs. using the 'viewer software' with one brand of camera that only works with their cameras.
b) set the motion detection at the software level, not the cameral level, set the video record quality, fps, resolution in Blueiris. it will do local recording and offsite/ftp archiving. you can set the motion dectection per camera with "frames before" and thresholds to your hearts desire.
c) comes with many cameras in their library (ie: a pull down screen) and will pull video from a pc or other source too. and if your camera isn't in their library, if you let the developer access your camera (just point it at a wall) and will tell you the /url to use, and you'll see your camera in their pull-down on the next release. nice service.

4) offsiting: if you have the bandwidth, you can do it. but most folks want everything at highest quality, so you can generate 2-3Mbps per camera (5 cameras will crush your fancy 15Mbps upload FIOS speed). For 'normal' non-IT folks, here's what i recommend: send all of your cameras to record to the pc/server that is running blueiris, and the camera that is watching your pc/server (you do plan on putting one there, right?), in addition to recording on that server/pc, have it's images (ie: .5 sec motion activated snapshots) emailed direct from the camera using it's settings to a new gmail account you set up just for this purpose. think of it this way, a BG robbing the 7-11 will want to trash the VCR, so you're grabbing snapshots of him trashing your "VCR". as long as you secure your 'net connection and have an UPS/battery, it will work.

5) cameras: for indoor PTZ with PoE and sound with good quality image, i've had good luck with Panasonic's BB line. For outdoor PoE i've used LevelOne and hear Axis is good.

6) setup. take your time and document it all. it's assumed you have a network and know what a router and switch are. give each camera a static IP on your lan, write down your username/password, and create a new 'read only' account for blueiris to use, makes that part easy. setup the camera for it's highest resolution/frame rate (you can always trim it later in Blueiris), do that for each camera. test them before you mount them :) Move cameras into place and viola, Blueiris supports browser viewing with/without password. (and archiving to ftp, email notices, etc) it's a good deal for $49 for unlimited cameras (your cpu will run out of HP before you do).

the dlink dcs wired works, i have one but the quality of the image is definitely lacking when shown '2up' or 4up side by side with the panasonic BB's or levelones'.
 
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I agree, document your network, make physical (wiring, hardware) and logical (IP addresses, protocols, etc) maps of your networks. Also have configuration logs for everything. Keep this all OFFSITE and SECURE. I reccomend an encrypted flash drive for this.

For bandwidth....I would avoid offsite servers unless you have a HUGE connection (pipe). I used to have a 37/15MB connection, and while it can handle mass amounts of info....doing a house instead of an apartment would overload the connection. An alternative is to have motion detector activated cameras, and have them upload to a remote server only when activated. This would give you a series of incident reports.

The final note....BATTERY BACKUP EVERYTHING. My network hardware itself has just short of 4 hours of battery backup. When the entire neighborhood goes black, my internet connection is still standing. Make sure your cameras are still standing as well. This will prevent "power outage" exploitation.

Battery backups (called a UPS, Uninterruptable Power Supply) can be had for as little as $30, but the price goes up according to how much current draw and battery capacity you need from it. You should have one for your HDTVs anyways, since they are susceptible to power fluctuations that UPSs are great at filtering out. Just make sure to get one with a fast "clamping" speed. The clamping speed is how fast it can switch to battery only useage when the AC power dips below an acceptable range. A UPS with a slow clamping speed will still exhibit voltage dips, which may cause things to power off...thus defeating it's purpose.

The good UPSs start around $100 and up if you're looking for a good name brand (like APC).
 
hasnt anyone considered the fact that if the owner of the cameras can log onto a website, type in a password and user name and instantly be watching live footage from every camera they set up for remote viewing, that any numbnut with free time and 50 dollars worth of "hacking" software can as well?

what about laws against illegal surveilance of people in your house?
 
First off, any decent online service will take substantially more than that to get into an account.

If you have ever been on a highly political forum, you will note that from time to time, DOS attacks will be launched which will make it difficult to impossible for people to access the site. Doing this means infiltrating many, many, computers with malware that will target that site. It takes alot of work.

If it were really possible for any numbnut to get into any password protected system like that, it would be much simpler for them to get into the admin account and create massive havoc.

Second, what do you mean, illegal surveillance? Unless he's sneaking cameras into his daughter's bedroom or bathroom or something, all he has to do is post that the area is under surveillance, like stores do.
 
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Nico asked: "hasnt anyone considered the fact that if the owner of the cameras can log onto a website, type in a password and user name and instantly be watching live footage from every camera they set up for remote viewing, that any numbnut with free time and 50 dollars worth of "hacking" software can as well?"

you assume to much about my/anyone's setup, and too little of the security. but it is a warning to those less in the know.

'web accessible' defines the protocol (http) for accessing the blueiris server, in my case. that does not mean it's open to the public internet. It's only open to my pc and laptop while on my LAN, and my wpa2 secured wifi. there is no direct access to the 'video server' from the net, period, there is nothing to 'hack'. i have a <snip> level certified VPN into my home lan from anywhere in the world, through which i view the video remotely when i require. if someone can hack this 'name brand' locked down setup (via an undocumented exploit for which i'm on all industry alert lists), they'll be hitting a lot of other juicier targets (.gov, finance) before they hit me :) even guests i know/trust in my home are on a different wifi/network than my 'trusted' personal systems with a different wifi-ssid. vlans are cool.

for the non techies: don't allow "uPnP" in your Linksys/netgear/<insert best buy brand> firewall, you don't want to open up anything to the net unless you absolutely mean to. for the reasons in my earlier post, i like Blueiris, but i still dont' trust it open to the net on port 80, even with user/password protection, hence the vpn. again, for non techies, a service like goto my pc/logmein, will get you to your pc, but video rendering over either service is less than ideal.
 
Nico, there's too many factors to the authentication I used...part of why I don't talk about it. The security I applied is enough that anyone that uses a "tool" will not only fail to get in, but I will also know when and what happened. Even wireless networks can be made secure, it just requires more work to make the signal worthless to those that are sniffing the wireless transmissions.

Best bet is learning about social engineering....once you learn to not fall for SE attacks, you are 75% of the way there. Rule 1 of stopping social engineering....never disclose the security methods. Build your own, make them solid....think like you want to break in.

Social engineering is the act of extracting information from someone that shouldn't be giving that information to you. It relies on you thinking that person is supposed to have this info, or there's no foul in giving it to them. The solution for this is "prove yourself"....when someone calls claiming to be your bank's fraud protection....ask them a question only they can answer but they would never ask you. One-way authentication is a flawed system, it must go both ways for a truly secure communication.

If you want to understand social engineering, find this book from Kevin Mitnick: The Art of Deception. It's got plenty of real world examples of social engineering at work. The answer is to never give anything to anyone you do not know and is not expected. If they claim to be over your head, verify it....they can prove it if they are in fact legit.

Once social security is out of the way, then work on computer/network security. This will take some studying so one can get used to how network hardware and computer software all work together. Honestly, it's a pain in the rump, but it's worth knowing it if you wish to go this route.
 
So, if I send you an email claiming I'm from your ISP, checking up on an attack on your system, and ask for your connection information so I can run a diagnostic, you aren't likely to tell me how to get into your system?
 
Failure to authenticate will at the least cause a hang up, at the worst, I'll notify authorities at all relevant levels. I don't play well with scammers.

The only people that have access are those I trust with my life....and I even have a system to track if any of those people leak information (there's only two). Paranoia is crucial to solid security.
 
ChaoSS said:
So, if I send you an email claiming I'm from your ISP, checking up on an attack on your system, and ask for your connection information so I can run a diagnostic, you aren't likely to tell me how to get into your system?
Click to expand...

Well, I'd say the fair majority of IT professionals don't plug their computers into the modem and call it a day. There's nothing on these networks that you can access from the outside, short of being made privy to VPN passwords. My passwords are of sufficient length and complexity that it would take you approximately 350 million years to crack them using commonly available cracking tools - if you could run the tests nonstop. Since I boot you out for an hour after a few incorrect attempts it would take considerably longer. As far as someone calling me up and asking me for my home IP address to ping, I have no problem in providing that.

My home network's external IP address is 141.116.168.135.
 
My home network's external IP address is 141.116.168.135.
Click to expand...
Thank you sir, but in order to properly diagnose your system and ensure that you are safe from hackers, I need those passwords. If you could provide those, I'd be happy to make sure your system is properly secure.;)
 
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