Re: Win11 explorer bug?

"Don Y" <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote in message news:vjfg9k$2tnfq$1@dont-email.me...

On 12/12/2024 12:32 PM, Edward Rawde wrote:

Is there any reason the camera can't talk to a phone that is also
hosted by the customer's access point?
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If you want to let the camera access a phone that is NOT "local",
then let the user subscribe to a DynDNS service -- provided by
any number of competing firms (even the manufacturer -- via a nice
clean OPEN interface).

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Inbound is problematic for various reasons.
Do you want your cameras accepting inbound connections from anywhere in the world?

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Vendors have no problem selling "hubs" as a prerequisite to talk to
their devices.  Why can't the hub implement a packet filter?

One reason is that the packet filtering would have to be configured specifically for local requirements.
This gets us back to the issue of most people not knowig a packet filter if they fell over it.

Use that as a selling point:  the hub can act to protect the
local network (for a fee!!) while their access point/router likely
has not been reliably configured for that purpose.
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Ok they don't have access credentials but there's still a risk of an 0-day in a camera system which isn't going to get any more
firmware updates.

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Simply putting the camera (or any device manufactured by someone who
may or may not be trustworthy) on your "internal network puts you
at risk.
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E.g., I can open an outbound connection to hostile_actor.com and let
an external agent act as command-and-control, telling me (the camera)
what to do ON THE INTERNAL NETWORK.

I don't permit outbound connections to a long list of countries.
I can always whitelist if it does turn out that I need to connect to a server in one of those countries.

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This traffic can be disguised to look innocuous.  E.g., resolving
"whatshouldIdo.hostile_actor.com" can deliver data to the camera that
can be augmented by then resolving "whatELSEshouldIdo.hostile_actor.com".
Results can be delivered to the external agency by resolving
"thepasswordisFOOBAR.hostile_actor.com", etc.
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Or, open an HTTP connection to hostile_actor.com and anyone looking
through the logs (ha!) would just think a user visited a website of
with an oddly suspicious domain name.  (So, buy up yahooo.com,
goggle.com, etc.)
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I would do this myself because I can use a firewall to restrict inbound as necessary and I can quickly add any IP or network
attempting brute force to a blacklist.
But most people have no interest in that.

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Hence the value of a "hub".
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I "hide" my file server behind a particular "knock sequence" that is
only known to folks who should need access to it.  Trying to probe
the IP address gets you no information -- it looks like there isn't
a machine AT that IP address.

I don't see any additional value in this provided the file server is restricted to specific IP addresses or networks and the
connection is secure.

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Of course, the machine SEES all attempts to connect to it.  And, which
ports and protocols are being used -- and in which sequence -- from every
potential external IP.  So, if it sees the right combination of accesses
in a particular time frame, it will THEN respond to a connection attempt
for a particular service.  Or, "callback" on a preassigned port on
the "caller's" IP address (as many ISPs frown on operating a server...
but, no constraints on ACCESSING some external service -- even if doing
so at the behest of said service!)
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Meanwhile, other attempts AT THE SAME TIME still see a "dangling wire".
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Once a connection is granted, there are no limits on what can be
transfered (set up a tunnel and all of those transactions are hidden)
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Most people just want the pictures on their phone wherever they are and they may wrongly assume that it's impossible for the
pictures to be viewed by anyone other than themselves.

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<https://www.shodan.io/search?query=camera>
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Even if you can't (easily) access the video, the fact that someone has
INSTALLED a camera (five cameras??) has informational value.

A nearby store installed cameras not long ago.
The number if cameras (or what looked like there were cameras inside them) made it easy to conclude that they were fake.

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