Ever felt you are being watched? That’s ridiculous, right!! There might be hidden cameras in regular places you go. Take examples of changing rooms in malls, trial rooms, hotel rooms, your office, and many other places. That’s a privacy breach, right? How can someone just peep into your personal life, or the time, you are willing to spend alone? How To Find Hidden Cameras Using Mobile Phones?
Do you ever feel that someone is watching you? You can only find out the truth if you have some ways to detect any hidden cameras in places you go regularly. Are you in any way thinking that you might need costly professional tools to do so? Let me clarify that. Absolutely not. You don’t need to spend any sort of money to do that. The device detects what is right in your hand. Yes, it’s your smartphone. You can detect any hidden cameras in any place just by using your smartphone. So!! Ready to find the hidden cameras??
Learn more: Can’t take screenshot due to security policy
There’s a chance that you are being watched:
It is very natural that you might have filmed yourself somewhere, sometime in public places. If not so, you might have seen yourself being caught in the CCTV cameras. Almost everyone experienced that. You might also have been filmed from a distance for a news channel reporting news from a specific place. It’s very natural, and it can happen with anyone co-incidentally.
But have you ever thought about a closed room? Let’s say you are changing dresses, in the trial room of some mall, or you are in a hotel with your partner, or in your office. It can be dangerous if someone is keeping a track of all of the moves you are performing in a closed room. It’s ridiculous, right? What if someone is watching you constantly?
Over the years, and with the advancement of technology, it isn’t surprising at all as we’ve become more accepting of closed-circuit cameras, CCTV cameras, and many more compact filming devices. Nobody is actually comfortable with this. But you have to ensure your own safety on your own terms. The proverb goes, “Prevention is better than cure .”So, it’s better to get a pre-requisite knowledge about the said topic, so you can check closed rooms for hidden cameras before performing any activity there.
Now, there definitely arises a question, as to, why would someone commit such an act?
The answer is simple, to promote nuisance and to misuse the films. Keep reading the article if you do not want this to happen with you or any person you know.
Smartphones can also detect hidden cameras:
You are probably reading this article from your smartphone. Did you know, that this compact device you are holding in your hand can be a big help when you are suspicious about a place being installed with hidden cameras?
You can perform this experiment independently. There are generally two methods by which a smartphone detects secretly installed cameras. They are:
Confirming via electromagnetic fields. Cameras or any other electronic device emit electromagnetic fields. You can track these fields with the help of your smartphone and find out if there are any hidden cameras installed. There are specific applications which are free to use, that detects these electromagnetic fields. Firstly, you need to do some guesswork as to where the camera might have been installed. Once, guessing that, try running the application in that specific area. If the application detects a strong electromagnetic field in that position, there are high chances the place is installed with hidden cameras. Check the objects, or walls of that area to find the camera.
Detecting light reflecting from the lens. Try this experiment in your home. Almost everyone has a television in their home, which comes with a remote control. You’ll observe that, there is an LED in the front of the remote control, which controls the television. Open the camera, of your phone, and place it on top of the LED. Now press any key on the remote control. When you press the key, you’ll see the LED glows for a very short time. That’s infrared rays.
If you scan a closed dark room with your mobile phone camera, it will detect any infrared ray, being emitted by any device. Also, the light gets reflected from the lens of the hidden cameras. You can also detect that light with the help of your mobile phone camera, to detect the position of the hidden camera.
You can find applications to detect hidden cameras in app stores of iOS or Android phones. Some of them are paid, while most of them are free.
Hidden surveillance cameras in a closed room? Find out, how to detect them:
You can try any sort of apps. You will be able to find hidden cameras, speakers, and computers, in a closed room.
All of them, more or less work in a similar way, i.e., proximity to the hidden camera is detected.
There is enough information provided, to give you an idea as to where, the hidden device might be located.
For example, we used the detectify app, present on playstore launched by WonderTech studios.
This application has two modes of operation.
One is by detecting the hidden camera with an infrared camera. The other is by using a magnetometer.
When we clicked on the “DETECT INFRARED CAMERA.” The camera of the phone opened, with an infrared filter. The app suggested scanning the closed room by switching off the lights, to detect the infrared radiation. We switched off the lights, and it looked something like this:
When we clicked on, “DETECT USING MAGNETOMETER,” a screen opened, with a constantly moving graph, telling us the electromagnetic radiation being radiated by a device, when the mobile phone is held in close proximity with the device.
The electromagnetic radiation will exceed 100 when the application detects a hidden camera. There were also, tips given by the app for manual detection of cameras. We explored the bedroom option, and it gave us possibilities of where, a camera might have been hidden.
How to find a hidden camera via Wi-Fi?
This method works only when the hidden camera is connected via Wi-Fi. Turn on the Wi-Fi. Scan for available devices. The list of scanned devices will show if there are any hidden surveillance devices in the closed room connected via Wi-Fi, or other wireless networks. You can also try the same by turning on the Bluetooth. If there are any unknown suspicious Bluetooth devices nearby, your mobile can detect them effectively.
How to detect hidden surveillance cameras effectively?
Other devices you might be having in the closed room, such as television, computers, or smart assistants, can interfere in the process of detecting the camera. It is because, these electronic devices emit electromagnetic radiation as well.
However, it will help if you hold the smartphone correctly to detect electromagnetic radiations emitted by a hidden camera. More and more practice of holding the smartphone at a certain angle can help you detect the hidden device more effectively. Try removing the phone case before doing the above steps, as some special cases made with some specific material disrupt the incoming signals, thus interfering with the detection process. It can sometimes interfere with the phone’s own radiation field as well. Removing the case, might give you better and more accurate results.
How to detect any hidden camera professionally?
There are quite a few methods which are certified and professional.
Method 1: HIRE AN EXPERT ADVISOR
This is the most reliable method of finding any hidden security cameras in a closed room that might monitor your movements. Try hiring a professional technician who knows how to handle these situations with proper pieces of equipment.
The advantages of these are, that the user gives minimal personal effort. Secondly, there is high efficiency as the situation is being handled by a technician with experience in the field.
However, everything comes with a set of disadvantages as well, such as there might be apartment restrictions. This method is a bit more costly than the ones stated above, and you have to wait for a long time for getting the perfect results as professional equipment handling takes time.
Method 2: DETECT USING DEDICATED EQUIPMENTS
Electromagnetic radiation detectors r optical detectors are used to handle these types of situations. These tools are a bit expensive. However, the cheapest ones with a range of 4-5 feet are in the range of 3$ to 5$ respectively. The cost of the detection device mainly depends on the range of the device.
This method also comes with a set of advantages and disadvantages, respectively.
The advantages are that there remains an option for regular checks, and they are independent devices.
Disadvantages related to this are the time and skill requirements. We need a professional to buy the equipment types and operate them for the most efficient results.
What to do when you find a hidden camera, where it isn’t supposed to be?
No doubt, tracking someone of their each and every move without the person’s knowledge is definitely illegal. If you face this, the first thing you should do is head to the nearest police station, to let the higher authorities deal with the situation.
However, you can also mask the camera lens with tape, or perform activities beyond the viewing angle. The hidden cameras are mainly in smoke detectors, so it can be difficult to stay out of the camera viewing angle and perform things.
In India, stalking or spying via any mode, be it, physical, electronic, or via text messages, calls, and e-mails, is a criminal offense. Caught doing this is punishable, and you can end up around 1-3 years in jail.
If anyone observes the usage by a person of the internet, e-mail, or any other form of electronic medium that results in anxiety or violence, or disrupts the mental stability of the person being stalked, commits the offense of stalking.
Women who are being stalked can complain to the National Commission of Women(NCW), and the board will take the issue up to the police and deal with the technicalities. Anyone n any part of the US can file a complaint against stalking. In serious cases, the commission forms an inquiry committee, by which the initiates the spot inquiry, examines the witness, and collects evidence regarding the situation. The commission also has powers to summon the accused.
Frequently Asked Questions(FAQs):
Answer: The secret surveillance cameras are generally smaller in size. The best spy cameras can record up to 4k of ultra HD videos. These cameras have a manually adjustable zoom lens. So, the answer is, yes, spy cameras have the zoom in or out feature within them. It can zoom up to around 5 times the range.
Answer: The camera’s resolution solely depends upon the technology used in the camera. The ranges miniature cameras generally have a short range of resolution, say around 460-900 pixels. However, if you want ultra HD picture quality, you can always buy a camera with a better build and technology. Please note that such cameras will be a bit more costly than those with low resolutions.
Answer: The surveillance cameras have a slot for a micro SD card, making it possible to save recorded videos. Normally a spy camera doesn’t come with a memory card, and it depends on the user whether they are willing to enter an SD Card in the camera or not. The space range of the spy camera is around 16 to 256 GBs.
Answer: Spy cameras nowadays are mainly wireless. These cameras have a separate slot for sound recording, known as the miniature recording system. Sound and video are recorded at the same time in order to have irrefutable evidence in case of disputes(if any).
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