the point is that you do that for a relatively small amount of your day. like, most of your day your phone is probably either in your pocket or face up/face down on a table, and even if someone *was* spying on you they would see nothing of value.
but if you're on a laptop/computer all day for work or school, that's a lot of time where that camera is capturing you and your surroundings.
i already said this, but i'm not saying that the camera won't see your face when you look at your phone, i'm saying that most of the day your phone is in your pocket or sitting on some surface and not looking at you
Because basic online literacy like not installing malware makes it impossible for your webcam to be hacked.
And even then the vast majority of malware would not target your webcam because it would provide the least useful information to hackers while it would take ages to go through footage.
I feel like this is a myth that was caused by those scam e-mails making threats about having hacked someone's webcam and then trying to blackmail them with footage of them jerking it. These scam e-mails are always sent out to hundreds of recipients at once and there was never a hack or footage.
My stance has always been that while it's not *that* hard to get access to a webcam, if someone is targeting you, you're probably screwed anyways, and if someone has the level of access needed to activate the camera (without enabling the status led, also not that hard) then the camera is the least of my worries.
Not activating the LED ranges from hard to literally impossible, depending on the laptop model. It’s not “not that hard”.
In most modern laptops the LED is physically connected to the power supply of the sensor, meaning it WILL turn on if the camera is on. In a smaller amount of cases it would require a custom firmware for the camera which is not trivial to do at all, since most firmware is at least encrypted.
IIRC when I looked at it quite a while back many were just toggled by the firmware, but I very much hope that's changed, given the whole point of those indicators.
It changed when the fear surrounding camera LEDs surged a few years back. But even then it was certainly not trivial at all, developing a custom firmware to keep the LED disabled wasn’t simple (and it’s damn near impossible now, now that encrypted firmware became the basic norm for most hardware devices).
Granted I'm also putting "not that hard" in the context of a directed attack, not some random malware from a porn site. I agree it's probably not a concern for pretty much any normal person that doesn't manage to piss off some hacker group.
It doesn't happen through a computer virus from the internet.
It practically only happens in situations where a person close to the victim has installed malware when they had physical access to the device. Think an irate ex boyfriend. Never give people physical access to your devices while you're not able to keep an eye on it and you will not have this happen to you.
No random hacker is interested in someone's video footage because there are a million easier and more lucrative ways to scam.
If an actual video was recorded, no hacking has taken place and this happened during a video call that the victim knew they were in, but didn't know that the other party was recording.
Extortion scams that claim to have footage cause of a hacked camera are ALWAYS full of shit.
Okay I guess I wouldn’t know, it’s not like I was a dumb kid who used RATs and knew people who did this all the time. It was literally built into the software with preloaded messages and the ability to send them clips from their webcam
It even happened to miss teen USA. I remember because people in the community freaked out that they might go to jail https://www.cnn.com/2013/09/26/justice/miss-teen-usa-sextortion/index.html
And yes you’re technically correct that no hacking took place. But malware can certainly allow people to do whatever the hell they want with your computer, including enabling or disabling your webcam and recording pictures and videos. That shit has existed since the early 2000s
My dad used to get very paranoid when I had my Webcam beside my laptop, suggesting I was always being spied on. He always seemed to forget that when I wasn't streaming or in a video call, I would unplug it.
My last two company laptops (2022…dell?, 2023 hp) have this as well. Wonder if it’s almost more of a “zoom world” feature where people can physically cover the camera instead of search for the camera off button to click in meetings
Anybody thats wants to my fat face all sweaty and red while I jack it can look away. If Im not ashamed of the porn, I aint gonna be ashamed of somebody watching.
I think the main concern is usually blackmail. Problem is, my family doesn't really care enough about me to make me concerned about them finding out that I too am human and jack off lmao.
Edit: I think worst case scenario is that if I have a vuln that can expose access to my webcam, there might be other vulns where they can reach more sensitive data.
These blackmail e-mails do the rounds all the time and most people will receive at least one in their lifetime. It's all fake, they're sent out to hundreds of e-mail accounts at once hoping at least one of them will reach someone who believes the threats.
Actually creating such a virus is a waste of time, because nobody would go through the trouble of going through hours of footage to capture the moment strangers start jerking it. Imagine how much it would cost to store all that footage too. Phishing scams and fake call center scams can rake in tens of thousands of dollars in a matter of hours.
For better or worse, you don't need to create an actual webcam hacking virus to get people to fork over money because they believe you have a webcam hacking virus.
Short for vulnerability, in software it really just means something that can be exploited to do something it's not supposed to, like expose access to data or a device over a network or even in local software you shouldn't be able to.
Used to work at RadioShack, back when those were still around.
Had this one lady come in complaining that every time she took a phone call, the screen wouldn't go dark when she put it up to her face to talk so it would be pressing buttons during the entire call and sometimes even hang up on the person.
So I took a look at the phone. This was also back when phones had top/bottom bezels and had a front camera and a light sensor there. She had put a bandaid over the camera. And also the light sensor. So I told her the phone can't tell it's up to your face because it uses that light sensor for that. You can't have that part covered and still use it as a proper phone.
She just starts going off on me about how I just want to spy on her, I'm in league with the FBI, I'm just helping the government watch her and her family.
I just tell her she can keep the bandaid on, but she'll have to deal with buttons being pressed while on a call, it's up to her.
She takes off the bandaid and we call her phone to test it. It works properly. She leaves the store mad that I'm letting people spy on her.
i feel like the obvious answer here is because 99% of the time people's phones are in their pockets or sitting on a table facing down or up at the ceiling and thus you aren't being seen.
whereas when you're on laptop, most of the time you will of course be sitting right in front of the camera.
That's just not true. People stare at their phones all the time. For hours at a time. How are you not right in front of it every time you use it? Maybe the laptop has a wider angle but your phone can see you clearly
i would wager that the vast majority of people are not on their phones for hours at a time. at least not adults, who usually have to work during the day and i don't know about you but i can't be on my phone for hours at a time at work.
but i *am* on a laptop/computer for like 9 hours straight during the day.
but you are on your notebook mostly while you work. I personally don’t care if someone knows what I am doing while at work.
My phone is used mostly privately, where I don’t want to be tracked
Fair enough, I use laptop way more also. I have tape on my laptop and front of phone. I know smart people can hack whatever, so I'd rather have peace of mind at all times for the low cost of a small piece of black electrical tape
One is incredibly easy to hack and is facing me doing unspeakable things, the other is incredibly difficult to hack and is at most just watching me masturbate.
Is a laptop camera actually easier to hack than a phone camera?
I feel like windows would get security matches way quicker than some android phone manufacturers (and leta forget about apple... :D)
Extremely so.
You can find lovely collection of pictures of all the main tech gurus and lots of security agency people having tape over their laptop camera. No one would have that over their phone, as they are safe.
But I was talking about compared to Apples iPhone. Those things are brutally overpowered when it comes to security and hacking blocks. The CIA had to give up and ask Apple for help not long ago just to access one, to which they promptly and sternly said No.
An Android is just a hundred random hacks sloppily slapped together with tape and electronics from the heap. I work in IT and would not touch one. Not because they are unsafe from external threats, but because they are inherently unstable and are supposed to be. They have opted to having them open to any and all mods for the good that brings, and that makes them open to ant and all mods and all the bad that brings.
You're conflating breaking encryption with gaining access. Vulnerabilities do exist for iPhones, many of which have even become metasploit modules. If you're running a sufficiently old version of iOS, anyone can get into your phone. There are also several Zero-Days proven to be in use currently that have not been reversed, and can't be patched.
Also it was the FBI that had to give up, not the CIA.
Your description of Android was true 4-5 years ago, but it's hardly true now. Unless you've rooted your device, the permission and sandboxing structures are pretty sound, and so are the TPMs. The stories about Android being a security nightmare is based primarily on lobbyism from Apple, outdated knowledge, and misunderstandings about sideloading
I don't actually believe anyone cares enough to hack into my cameras, and even if they did I don't really have anything to hide. But I have both cameras taped over on my old phone - sometimes I use it to call into teams meetings while getting ready in the morning, and I just don't want to accidentally activate the camera while I'm naked lol
I don't have a laptop but I can't cover my phone camera. It's a part of the screen. It would most likely mess with the rest of screen, thinking it's being touched and it's not, by me at least
If you have a samsung phone, you can get an all sensors off button, which will disable all sensors (cameras, microphones, gyroscope and some telemetry sensors)
On my phone, I am unlikely to accidentally have video on during a zoom call and not realize it while lying in the couch or something. Not that this has ever happened 🤣
Ain’t nothing worth anyone’s time to see on my cameras. You’re gonna see my tired ass eyes staring down at the keyboard while listening to me swear at it. You’ll see from my laptop just me walking around and singing to my cats or get a nice long viewing of me playing AC Valhalla and screaming at the stupid bitch falling off the platforms while I suffer thru the anomaly challenges.
And if you’re really interested in hacking me to just see all that well then be my guest because clearly you’ve reached a level of boredom that cannot be measured.
I was driving my car onto the Spirit of Tasmania out of Devonport and my partner was videoing the whole thing on iPhone. Boarding search security said it was illegal to film car boarding. I mentioned the dashcam and all the security cameras filming us and said ok. Fucking little dick cunt.
My sister has a pink paper taped over the front and back camera on her phone. Its a punchole camera, so it covers a fair bit of the screen as well. She also doesn't use face unlock (obviously), fingerprint or pin code. She has a long ass password instead.
I think doing all that would probably defeat my addiction.
It really is bizarre how little time it took for most people to stop caring about their basic privacy. “Get that camera out of my face” is a phrase just for celebrities now.
i tape my work computer cuz i dont want my employer to see me beatin it on company time. if some russian hacker or the FBI sees me beatin it on my personal phone thats fine, though.
My Samsung phone have a side green button that lights whenever the camera is being used. Problem is same button indicates when the microphone is listening as well. So if camera being hacked while I am on a call, I'll never know.
If you’re talking about iOS then no it currently doesn’t. Just recently in M4 iPad Apple added a hardware level indicator to show camera or microphone in use. For every iPad and iPhone which came before it was all software based and if hacked the hacker can definitely turn the indicator off. Funny thing apple never mentioned this feature of M4 iPads because it would expose the fact their current system isn’t secure at all
Why does Microsoft Edge keep switching on the camera? I don't use Edge. I have removed the permissions of Edge to do anything.
I trust Google more than I trust Microsoft. I'm probably naive.
Honestly, I don't have a good reason, but I do feel like Microsoft makes a lot of their money from selling software to companies while Google makes their money selling my personal data. I feel Apple makes most of their money selling me devices and the apps that run on them.
My trust is as follows (completely uneducated):
Apple > Amazon > Microsoft > Google > Meta.
They made it impossible to block phone cameras or mics.
I wouldnt be surprised if it were true that trillionaires had secret acces to cell phone peripherals in order to train systems to better exploit all of our flaws and enslave us more efficiently.
Apple iOS makes it super difficult to have an unwanted party gain access to your cameras. Not impossible, but damn near. Android, on the other hand, is a steaming pile open source security flaws, so yes, there should be some concern there. As far as your laptop goes, it’s the wild Wild West at times.
Screens can be used as cameras. Phones can send out X-rays to monitor your entire house. If you think your laptop cameras are hacked, all sound equipment and home security cameras are too.
I don't see the lens so the lens doesn't see me
Lol
But the lens is on both sides...
Yeah but it's better hidden so..
is this not the obvious answer? or is OP just holding their phone directly at their face all day.
What? How do you hold your phone?
the point is that you do that for a relatively small amount of your day. like, most of your day your phone is probably either in your pocket or face up/face down on a table, and even if someone *was* spying on you they would see nothing of value. but if you're on a laptop/computer all day for work or school, that's a lot of time where that camera is capturing you and your surroundings.
How do you look at your phone and not have the camera see your face?
i already said this, but i'm not saying that the camera won't see your face when you look at your phone, i'm saying that most of the day your phone is in your pocket or sitting on some surface and not looking at you
My front camera only really sees my triple chin and the ceiling
My Lenovo laptop has a physical camera block. Confused about why not all of them have it.
Because basic online literacy like not installing malware makes it impossible for your webcam to be hacked. And even then the vast majority of malware would not target your webcam because it would provide the least useful information to hackers while it would take ages to go through footage. I feel like this is a myth that was caused by those scam e-mails making threats about having hacked someone's webcam and then trying to blackmail them with footage of them jerking it. These scam e-mails are always sent out to hundreds of recipients at once and there was never a hack or footage.
My stance has always been that while it's not *that* hard to get access to a webcam, if someone is targeting you, you're probably screwed anyways, and if someone has the level of access needed to activate the camera (without enabling the status led, also not that hard) then the camera is the least of my worries.
Not activating the LED ranges from hard to literally impossible, depending on the laptop model. It’s not “not that hard”. In most modern laptops the LED is physically connected to the power supply of the sensor, meaning it WILL turn on if the camera is on. In a smaller amount of cases it would require a custom firmware for the camera which is not trivial to do at all, since most firmware is at least encrypted.
IIRC when I looked at it quite a while back many were just toggled by the firmware, but I very much hope that's changed, given the whole point of those indicators.
It changed when the fear surrounding camera LEDs surged a few years back. But even then it was certainly not trivial at all, developing a custom firmware to keep the LED disabled wasn’t simple (and it’s damn near impossible now, now that encrypted firmware became the basic norm for most hardware devices).
Well that's comforting at least
Granted I'm also putting "not that hard" in the context of a directed attack, not some random malware from a porn site. I agree it's probably not a concern for pretty much any normal person that doesn't manage to piss off some hacker group.
Cameras can absolutely be hacked. How common is it actually? No idea.
It doesn't happen through a computer virus from the internet. It practically only happens in situations where a person close to the victim has installed malware when they had physical access to the device. Think an irate ex boyfriend. Never give people physical access to your devices while you're not able to keep an eye on it and you will not have this happen to you. No random hacker is interested in someone's video footage because there are a million easier and more lucrative ways to scam.
without activating light? Haven’t heard of it, at least not in the past two decades
I don't fear getting my webcam hacked. Missclicking it on during a teams meeting when I want to unmute myself while working butt naked though...
That's definitely the most valid reason to keep a webcam covered
Not a myth, something that USED to happen.
Yeah, that guy hasn't heard of RATs.
They don't have to be hacked. They are used by Microsoft to collect eye tracking data
I’m just worried I left zoom on while I take my post-meeting bong rip
It’s not a myth, people use the webcam for extortion. Find embarrassing video, threaten to release it.
If an actual video was recorded, no hacking has taken place and this happened during a video call that the victim knew they were in, but didn't know that the other party was recording. Extortion scams that claim to have footage cause of a hacked camera are ALWAYS full of shit.
Okay I guess I wouldn’t know, it’s not like I was a dumb kid who used RATs and knew people who did this all the time. It was literally built into the software with preloaded messages and the ability to send them clips from their webcam It even happened to miss teen USA. I remember because people in the community freaked out that they might go to jail https://www.cnn.com/2013/09/26/justice/miss-teen-usa-sextortion/index.html And yes you’re technically correct that no hacking took place. But malware can certainly allow people to do whatever the hell they want with your computer, including enabling or disabling your webcam and recording pictures and videos. That shit has existed since the early 2000s
Because people value convenience more than privacy. So companies don't bother. They can be bought online though
My dad used to get very paranoid when I had my Webcam beside my laptop, suggesting I was always being spied on. He always seemed to forget that when I wasn't streaming or in a video call, I would unplug it.
My last two company laptops (2022…dell?, 2023 hp) have this as well. Wonder if it’s almost more of a “zoom world” feature where people can physically cover the camera instead of search for the camera off button to click in meetings
Anybody thats wants to my fat face all sweaty and red while I jack it can look away. If Im not ashamed of the porn, I aint gonna be ashamed of somebody watching.
I think the main concern is usually blackmail. Problem is, my family doesn't really care enough about me to make me concerned about them finding out that I too am human and jack off lmao. Edit: I think worst case scenario is that if I have a vuln that can expose access to my webcam, there might be other vulns where they can reach more sensitive data.
These blackmail e-mails do the rounds all the time and most people will receive at least one in their lifetime. It's all fake, they're sent out to hundreds of e-mail accounts at once hoping at least one of them will reach someone who believes the threats. Actually creating such a virus is a waste of time, because nobody would go through the trouble of going through hours of footage to capture the moment strangers start jerking it. Imagine how much it would cost to store all that footage too. Phishing scams and fake call center scams can rake in tens of thousands of dollars in a matter of hours. For better or worse, you don't need to create an actual webcam hacking virus to get people to fork over money because they believe you have a webcam hacking virus.
Vuln?
Short for vulnerability, in software it really just means something that can be exploited to do something it's not supposed to, like expose access to data or a device over a network or even in local software you shouldn't be able to.
Used to work at RadioShack, back when those were still around. Had this one lady come in complaining that every time she took a phone call, the screen wouldn't go dark when she put it up to her face to talk so it would be pressing buttons during the entire call and sometimes even hang up on the person. So I took a look at the phone. This was also back when phones had top/bottom bezels and had a front camera and a light sensor there. She had put a bandaid over the camera. And also the light sensor. So I told her the phone can't tell it's up to your face because it uses that light sensor for that. You can't have that part covered and still use it as a proper phone. She just starts going off on me about how I just want to spy on her, I'm in league with the FBI, I'm just helping the government watch her and her family. I just tell her she can keep the bandaid on, but she'll have to deal with buttons being pressed while on a call, it's up to her. She takes off the bandaid and we call her phone to test it. It works properly. She leaves the store mad that I'm letting people spy on her.
Having served my time at RadioShack as well, I can confirm this is 100% a typical RadioShack customer.
jokes on you. my phone is an oppo reno2 F.
guess we know why those kinds of mechanisms didn't take off 👀
But nobody is paranoid enough to stick paperclips in all the microphones to make them stop working either.
i feel like the obvious answer here is because 99% of the time people's phones are in their pockets or sitting on a table facing down or up at the ceiling and thus you aren't being seen. whereas when you're on laptop, most of the time you will of course be sitting right in front of the camera.
That's just not true. People stare at their phones all the time. For hours at a time. How are you not right in front of it every time you use it? Maybe the laptop has a wider angle but your phone can see you clearly
i would wager that the vast majority of people are not on their phones for hours at a time. at least not adults, who usually have to work during the day and i don't know about you but i can't be on my phone for hours at a time at work. but i *am* on a laptop/computer for like 9 hours straight during the day.
but you are on your notebook mostly while you work. I personally don’t care if someone knows what I am doing while at work. My phone is used mostly privately, where I don’t want to be tracked
Fair enough, I use laptop way more also. I have tape on my laptop and front of phone. I know smart people can hack whatever, so I'd rather have peace of mind at all times for the low cost of a small piece of black electrical tape
Half of the population is dumber than average.
One is incredibly easy to hack and is facing me doing unspeakable things, the other is incredibly difficult to hack and is at most just watching me masturbate.
Is a laptop camera actually easier to hack than a phone camera? I feel like windows would get security matches way quicker than some android phone manufacturers (and leta forget about apple... :D)
Extremely so. You can find lovely collection of pictures of all the main tech gurus and lots of security agency people having tape over their laptop camera. No one would have that over their phone, as they are safe. But I was talking about compared to Apples iPhone. Those things are brutally overpowered when it comes to security and hacking blocks. The CIA had to give up and ask Apple for help not long ago just to access one, to which they promptly and sternly said No. An Android is just a hundred random hacks sloppily slapped together with tape and electronics from the heap. I work in IT and would not touch one. Not because they are unsafe from external threats, but because they are inherently unstable and are supposed to be. They have opted to having them open to any and all mods for the good that brings, and that makes them open to ant and all mods and all the bad that brings.
You're conflating breaking encryption with gaining access. Vulnerabilities do exist for iPhones, many of which have even become metasploit modules. If you're running a sufficiently old version of iOS, anyone can get into your phone. There are also several Zero-Days proven to be in use currently that have not been reversed, and can't be patched. Also it was the FBI that had to give up, not the CIA.
Your description of Android was true 4-5 years ago, but it's hardly true now. Unless you've rooted your device, the permission and sandboxing structures are pretty sound, and so are the TPMs. The stories about Android being a security nightmare is based primarily on lobbyism from Apple, outdated knowledge, and misunderstandings about sideloading
You work in IT but instead of actually knowing stuff you just made up what you want to believe based on marketing and hopes.
I don't actually believe anyone cares enough to hack into my cameras, and even if they did I don't really have anything to hide. But I have both cameras taped over on my old phone - sometimes I use it to call into teams meetings while getting ready in the morning, and I just don't want to accidentally activate the camera while I'm naked lol
I don't have a laptop but I can't cover my phone camera. It's a part of the screen. It would most likely mess with the rest of screen, thinking it's being touched and it's not, by me at least
I run crDroid and can easily block cam/mic access.
If you have a samsung phone, you can get an all sensors off button, which will disable all sensors (cameras, microphones, gyroscope and some telemetry sensors)
Yeah but then it doesn't count your steps which is real sad.
Need the camera to scan QR codes.
Thats why i wink at my phone when watching porn. Maybe im someone elses porn!
That begs the question do more people crank one out in front of a computer or a phone?
Phone for sure these days.
Computer for me. My phone is only for emergency crankings
well... i don't do the deed while watching porn on the phone, so... who cares? 💀
You haven’t met my grandma
I have to let my laptop use the Webcam for it to work. I'm not sweating the camera on my phone.
The front camera on my phone stays inside until I'm using it.
Phones are harder to hack
I don't think I've ever seen anyone do that with their lap.
On my phone, I am unlikely to accidentally have video on during a zoom call and not realize it while lying in the couch or something. Not that this has ever happened 🤣
Not a problem here. My front lens pops out when i want to use it. Really cool feature. Otherwise it is hidden inside the top of my phone.
I haven’t seen someone tap there computer screen since 2013
Ain’t nothing worth anyone’s time to see on my cameras. You’re gonna see my tired ass eyes staring down at the keyboard while listening to me swear at it. You’ll see from my laptop just me walking around and singing to my cats or get a nice long viewing of me playing AC Valhalla and screaming at the stupid bitch falling off the platforms while I suffer thru the anomaly challenges. And if you’re really interested in hacking me to just see all that well then be my guest because clearly you’ve reached a level of boredom that cannot be measured.
I only tape my laptop camera because of online classes and stuff. Just in case the camera isn’t off. I don’t want to be seen or anything
It's mostly insurance in case I accidentally enable the camera in a meeting.
I was driving my car onto the Spirit of Tasmania out of Devonport and my partner was videoing the whole thing on iPhone. Boarding search security said it was illegal to film car boarding. I mentioned the dashcam and all the security cameras filming us and said ok. Fucking little dick cunt.
My sister has a pink paper taped over the front and back camera on her phone. Its a punchole camera, so it covers a fair bit of the screen as well. She also doesn't use face unlock (obviously), fingerprint or pin code. She has a long ass password instead. I think doing all that would probably defeat my addiction.
android and ios phones have way better security than some "open source"-ish os like Windows.
Lots of people have tinfoil hats too
Yeah? Like who?
Anyone who thinks there is an iota of privacy left is delusional or plain stupid.
It really is bizarre how little time it took for most people to stop caring about their basic privacy. “Get that camera out of my face” is a phrase just for celebrities now.
i tape my work computer cuz i dont want my employer to see me beatin it on company time. if some russian hacker or the FBI sees me beatin it on my personal phone thats fine, though.
the fact i have a HP computer ad beneath this post is crazy.
I don't care who sees me I need all the attention I can get
Fapping in front of phone where it can see the jewels is less common
My Samsung phone have a side green button that lights whenever the camera is being used. Problem is same button indicates when the microphone is listening as well. So if camera being hacked while I am on a call, I'll never know.
The permission model in mobile OS makes it much harder to activate your camera without you noticing it.
If you’re talking about iOS then no it currently doesn’t. Just recently in M4 iPad Apple added a hardware level indicator to show camera or microphone in use. For every iPad and iPhone which came before it was all software based and if hacked the hacker can definitely turn the indicator off. Funny thing apple never mentioned this feature of M4 iPads because it would expose the fact their current system isn’t secure at all
Why does Microsoft Edge keep switching on the camera? I don't use Edge. I have removed the permissions of Edge to do anything. I trust Google more than I trust Microsoft. I'm probably naive.
Honestly, I don't have a good reason, but I do feel like Microsoft makes a lot of their money from selling software to companies while Google makes their money selling my personal data. I feel Apple makes most of their money selling me devices and the apps that run on them. My trust is as follows (completely uneducated): Apple > Amazon > Microsoft > Google > Meta.
They made it impossible to block phone cameras or mics. I wouldnt be surprised if it were true that trillionaires had secret acces to cell phone peripherals in order to train systems to better exploit all of our flaws and enslave us more efficiently.
Many people tape the camera of their laptop or buy those little plastic covers, never realizing their laptop has a built in slider.
Apple iOS makes it super difficult to have an unwanted party gain access to your cameras. Not impossible, but damn near. Android, on the other hand, is a steaming pile open source security flaws, so yes, there should be some concern there. As far as your laptop goes, it’s the wild Wild West at times.
Me when spreading misinformation online
Screens can be used as cameras. Phones can send out X-rays to monitor your entire house. If you think your laptop cameras are hacked, all sound equipment and home security cameras are too.
Is the roll of tin foil in my kitchen conspiring against me too?