What happens when your child says he is hearing voices at night?
Naturally you ensure him that everything is alright and there is no boogy man hiding somewhere talking to him. Usually this will eventually make the child feel better and reassured that all is fine. Unless you are actually wrong.
Such was the case for a family living in Washington. They went through the usual disbelief when their boy told them he was scared at night because someone was talking to him over the phone at night. Never in Jay and Sarah’s wildest nightmare could they have imagined that they in fact were wrong and their child was right. And how this all happened was totally mind blowing, not to mention absolutely horrific for any parent to have to experience.
It turns out, that a stranger had hacked into their baby monitor and was actually spying on the toddler while speaking very disturbing messages into the unit!
“Wake up little boy, daddy’s looking for you.”
This was one of the continual disturbing messages. Jay, the father, happened to hear it one night, realizing it was coming from the baby monitor. Upon looking further and bringing his wife Sarah in the room, he heard, “look someone’s coming or someone’s coming into view.”
They both watched as the night-vision lens followed their movements as it was being controlled by a third party. The couple were completely freaked out and immediately called the manufacturer of the monitor, Foscam. They informed the couple of the possibility of a hack. The hackers could be using a smartphone app or a laptop to control the device.
This horrific experience is one that the parents want to make public to spread awareness that this type of thing does indeed go on, and baby monitors are subject to being hacked. While baby monitors focus their product on convenience as they become WIFI and smartphone app capable, they in turn open the door wide open for hackers and it turns out this is becoming more and more common.
What’s the solution? Besides going old school and not having baby monitors with internet accessibility, you should always change the camera’s password so it doesn’t match the Wi-Fi password, and always installing device updates right away is key to ensuring your privacy.
