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deaglecat

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 9, 2012
641
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Hi, I normally put a privacy guard on my laptop and tablet devices - as a very physical way of ensuring that the front facing camera is not active when I am not using it.

Does anybody know if / how this will work with face id and the new Ipad Pro ? I am assuming that it needs the camera to be visible to unlock - or are there other sensors in the face id assembly that do that stuff....

Maybe I am a Luddite, but personally I was happier with the idea of touch ID.
 
Hi, I normally put a privacy guard on my laptop and tablet devices - as a very physical way of ensuring that the front facing camera is not active when I am not using it.

Does anybody know if / how this will work with face id and the new Ipad Pro ? I am assuming that it needs the camera to be visible to unlock - or are there other sensors in the face id assembly that do that stuff....

Maybe I am a Luddite, but personally I was happier with the idea of touch ID.
You could just use a passcode each time. Otherwise it needs to be uncovered.

iOS is the most secure OS in the world because it's sandboxed and heavily locked down. The only real way for someone to use it to spy on you is if they are able to get access to your physical device and crack it without you knowing about it because you have to specifically give permission to apps to use the camera and microphone. And if you are honestly concerned that someone might break into your house and crack your device, then you've got some bigger problems in life that I can't help you with, lol.
 
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Well, both Zuckerberg and James Comey both are reported to tape their webcams because they don't trust the devices. Also there is an unpleasant underground community trading in Remote Access Trojans - albeit that as macduke has observed, it is way more difficult to take over an Ipad than a Windows PC.

Still I like hardware based privacy.
 
I wish I had such top secret things going on that people would take the time to spy on me through my device cameras. I have such a boring life compared to some.
I have the boringest of lives and yet, this has happened to me (on my MBP, just after upgrading to Mojave, and I have no malware). It’s super creepy.
 
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Well, both Zuckerberg and James Comey both are reported to tape their webcams because they don't trust the devices. Also there is an unpleasant underground community trading in Remote Access Trojans - albeit that as macduke has observed, it is way more difficult to take over an Ipad than a Windows PC.

Still I like hardware based privacy.
This is true. But you also have to consider your threat level. Guys like Comey and Zuck have to worry about State-level actors hacking their equipment. Us normal people don't really have to worry about being targeted that way. The risk that someone in your life who would want to target you also having the capability to hack iOS in that way is very very low.

tldr, I wouldn't worry about it so much.
 
iOS is constantly being found to have major bugs and flaws, that's what jailbreaking and other hacking communities exploit. iOS is at a billion users now.

So it's possible for that to happen just as much as a Mac or Android device could if they wanted to. Your iPhone is not secure against an attack.
 
I have the boringest of lives and yet, this has happened to me (on my MBP, just after upgrading to Mojave, and I have no malware). It’s super creepy.

Honest question, how did you confirm that it actually happened? If my camera light came in or I thought I was being spied on I’d just dance naked for them. That would scar them for life. Lol I wonder if those airport X-ray machines are saving our naked pictures? Sorry.. got off subject. Lol
 
Honest question, how did you confirm that it actually happened? If my camera light came in or I thought I was being spied on I’d just dance naked for them. That would scar them for life. Lol I wonder if those airport X-ray machines are saving our naked pictures? Sorry.. got off subject. Lol

What happened is that I went to check my email one morning, and while I was reading email I noticed that the camera light was on. I saw that FaceTime was active, so I opened it and tried to shut it down, but the option to quit was grayed out. I had to kill the process via the activity monitor. I rebooted and then ran 3 different malware detectors, with no results. A few nights later I found a message in my spam folder from someone claiming they caught me watching porn and had both camera video and screen video, trying to extort me, LOL. The said they’d send it to my contacts if I didn’t pay them.

The email it was sent to was part of a data breach, and someone had been using my Spotify and Hulu accounts, and it’s the same email tied to my Apple ID. I deleted the email, because even if they recorded me, the most embarrassing thing they could have seen was me in my not-revealing PJs, LOL. And I changed my PW, just in case.
 
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People will say this is “conspiracy theorist” crap, but so be it... They have indoctrinated the masses to believe anyone who questions anything anymore to be a nut case tin foil hat wearing freak who lives in a basement.
But that’s far from the truth, they just want a bunch of dumbed down people to only believe what the main stream media says is true.

Apple has been caught before selling finger prints, you won’t hear about this in the main stream but the information is out there. There is a reason they went with a finger print scanner. They claim it’s for ease of use and faster to unlock your devices. But let’s be honest, it takes barely 3 seconds to use a passcode to unlock. To think the government doesn’t collect finger prints of people from Apple, Samsung and so forth is a laugh.
Now they use Face ID, a full scan of your face. Not long after this was introduced China started installing security cameras in public that can destect citizens by identifying their faces. They are able to locate anyone, anywhere at anytime by scanning faces. Not only that, when the cam identifies you, all your info pops up... Everything about you, **** even Facebook information. Now, how did they get all that? And how are these cameras able to detect faces with ease in public?
Now, all companies are pushing Face ID.
Here in Japan they are starting to use the same cameras in public to identify all citizens. In New York towers went up with these cameras that look identical to the ones China uses, but they claim they are NOT scanning people... Ha! Think they are gonna inform people about this?

So in short, I’d be skeptical about Face ID no matter how secure people claim it is. Personally, I keep my iPhone X cam covered at all times and only use a passcode. I have noticed here in Japan government officials and even some police do the same.
 
I can’t speak for Japan and China, but in the US, most major cities are covered in both city-owned and privately-owned cameras that the police and other officials can tap into. There’s really no hiding. Apple won’t get much for selling face data, because the government likely has your face already.
 
Back to the original question, I don't believe the front-facing camera is part of the Face ID system. Could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure. If so, in theory, you could cover the camera, but not interfere with Face ID. Assuming you can block just exactly the right area and not others. It might take some experimenting, but I suspect you could do it.

Out of curiosity, I just tried it with my Max. I was able to use the corner of a napkin to cover the front-facing camera (it was 100% obstructed), but Face ID still worked.
 
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A few nights later I found a message in my spam folder from someone claiming they caught me watching porn and had both camera video and screen video, trying to extort me, LOL. The said they’d send it to my contacts if I didn’t pay them.
That episode of black mirror was so good
 
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