A web cam for home security with a “remote viewing” feature has been in the news lately. One story was wonderfully positive and shows the amazing life saving power of a home security surveillance camera. The other story was a cautionary tale to parents about the dangers of child pornographers and cheap web cams in children’s bedrooms.Is a home security web cam a security savior or a parent’s worst nightmare? The answer is YES.Saving A Life Half Way Around the WorldIn November, 2005, when a 69 year old diabetic artist from Norway, living in California, collapsed from low blood sugar, she might have died if it hadn’t been for her web cam for home security.Her son in the Philippines saw her lying motionless on the couch through her web cam’s remote viewing feature. He could see live action in his mother’s living room, even though he was half a world away.Knowing she is vulnerable as a diabetic, when he called and could see through the web cam security camera that he got no response from her, he became alarmed. He knew she was in danger. He tried to reach California emergency authorities with an international call from the Philippines, but couldn’t get through because he wasn’t sure whom to call.He called his brother in Bergen, Norway. Luckily, his sister-in-law, an American, knew just how to reach emergency responders in the California town and an ambulance was on its way immediately, arriving in 5 to 10 minutes. The woman’s life was saved.Other Uses for Web Cam SurveillanceThere have been other stories of web cam remote viewing saving the day for someone. There are several stories of families on vacation checking in on their web cam for home security from their resort hotel room and seeing a burglar in the act of pilfering their home. The protection of their web cam let them make a quick call to their hometown police and the crook was caught!Many people use a web cam for home security as a “nanny cam” allowing them to check up from work on how their children are being treated. Others use this cheap home security camera to monitor home repair people or maids, guarding against potential theft.The Dark Side of Web Cams For ChildrenThe second story in the news lately about a web cam with remote viewing centered around a vulnerable teenage boy who was exploited for child pornography. The 19 year old boy testified in early April before the House Energy and Commerce committee about the dangers of unsupervised children’s web cams.Parents, pay attention to this story.When the boy was 13, he got a web cam as part of a deal with his ISP. Neither he nor his divorced parents thought much about it or the need for safeguards. He was lonely and hoped to use it to make friends his own age online.Instead, a pedophile sent him a message within minutes of his image showing up on a community web site. More men followed. The lonely boy thought they were his friends, interested in him. Soon one of the men offered him $50 to take off his shirt in front of the web cam surveillance camera and helped him set up a PayPal account. Things got much, much worse and dangerous for the boy after that. He recently turned over to the Justice Department the names of 1500 child molesters and child porn subscribers.It’s Up To YouThe good news is that a web cam for home security can be insurance, a way to reassure yourself that things are going well in your home when you are away. It can provide a surveillance camera for a baby’s or ill relation’s room.The bad news is that the same home web cam for home security can also be used to invade your family’s privacy. Unless you set up a defense against it, a home security web cam can broadcast pictures of your loved ones and details of your house’s vulnerabilities onto websites criminals can view.If you buy a web cam for surveillance and home security, be sure you learn its workings thoroughly so you only have it turned on when you intend for it to be on. Make sure it is only sending pictures where you intend.Remember, an unsupervised web cam in a child’s bedroom is an invitation for potential trouble. You may want to keep the web cam in the supervised areas of the house, and disable the feature which streams your web cam’s pictures onto an internet site.Do your homework and find web cam home security software which provides features like motion detection, scheduling, email alerts and more. A web cam for home security can provide you with a good safety measure, but only if you choose the right system and use it properly. It’s also important to realize that a web cam system is only as good as the monitoring it gets. Before you invest in and install a web cam system, be sure to compare the professionally monitored home security systems recommended by most police departments. It costs nothing to get a quote.
Tag Archives: Security
Search Technologies to Solve the Problem of Information Security | sueatkins.info
Lately the problem of securing the information contained in the enterprise’s data space becomes more and more critical. It’s the information hidden from common access that is most valuable.Specialists in the field of information security distinguish two types of potential threats: external and internal ones. These threats are meant to be neutralized by the new security information management software. Systems providing security from external threats prevent unauthorized programs (such as worms, Trojan viruses, spy-programs, etc.) from running and block external attacks on system resources and processes. Yet in addition to all these, any company’s security system is threatened from within, and it’s the internal threats of information disclosure that make companies most vulnerable.What are these internal threats and how can you rid your enterprise of them? The danger lies in the fact that most employees have access to the organization’s repositories of information and are exempt from such network defenses as anti-virus programs, firewalls, even e-mail filters. Information leak is not always incompetent leaders’ or unqualified staff’s fault, more often the software installed on the enterprise and its shortcomings are to blame. The most probable variant of information security violation is the deliberate theft of confidential data by authorized users (insiders). Such things as conflict with the management, with fellow staff, trivial dissatisfaction with the salary may trigger the leak of confidential information to competitors as well as an attempt to destroy it.On the market there’s quite an extensive array of corporate applications designed to solve the problem of information security. Developers create not only complex means of information security but also systems oriented on withstanding certain groups of threats.When creating an information security system the developers try to extend its functional to the maximum so as to work in a variety of fields. Even operation systems today contain security functions designed to increase the enterprise’s safety level. But this “universality” is unacceptable when speaking of important and valuable data. A universal security system becomes useless in corporate networks where internal threats (insiders’ activity in particular) prevail.That’s why most people responsible for their organization’s information security prefer to use external security systems rather than those inbuilt into a standard operation system.Security market sees an ongoing growth in the number of security tools and large-scale monitoring systems designed to prevent internal threats. All of them strive to provide total control and consequently all aspects of information safeguarding and protecting for the entire organization.One of such tools that has already gained a high degree of popularity on the market is a security solution from SearchInform Technologies, a company well-known for developing a corporate full text search engine called SearchInform.It’s next to impossible to eradicate the risk of an insider gaining access to unauthorized information with the goal of theft and later disclosure to a third party. Solution from SearchInform Technologies lets you fully control this process from the ground up. The first stage is taken care of by SearchInform Security Server, which enables the user to work both with his PC and in the local network both with open and confidential information while preventing unauthorized data from appearing where it’s not supposed to. SearchInform Security Server in real time mode monitors all the file transactions and modifications taking place on user computers.The fact that this system is based on search technologies takes it to a significantly higher quality level. All the information in the local network gets indexed and becomes available for fast and quality full text search in it. While at that, the search itself is conducted not only by file names, but also by their contents. The search engine used in SearchInform Security Server acquired full functionality of SearchInform corporate search system. Quick indexing, support of over 60 file formats, correct work with databases, cashing system – to list only a few of its advantages.Search module lets you conduct information search in the data received from all the computers in the local network using a set list of keywords, phrases, or even text extracts. The information you get as a result will contain information on new, modified and deleted files containing key words; an alert system will send these results to the organization’s info security pro’s either through messenger, by e-mail or any other way convenient to the user.Control of internet traffic is of as high importance as the above since it has hitherto been the least controlled field. That’s the weakness insiders exploit to the fullest – Internet forms the bulk of how confidential information gets disclosed. SearchInform Traffic Analyzer is designed to monitor the whole of Internet-traffic. With its help you cant track not only all the http-traffic and logs of such instant messaging programs as MSN, Trillian, ICQ, etc., but also all the e-mail correspondence. It doesn’t matter which e-mail client the insider is using, even if the letters were sent through free e-mail clients (like Hotmail.com or gmail.com, for instance) rather than through the corporate mail server.Like in SearchInform Security Server, all the information gets indexed and is stored on the server for a certain period of time and is available for conducting full text search in it during that time. An alert system is set in a way that when a certain keyword or phrase appears in search results on a user computer, the corresponding information is sent to the organization’s information security person.Electronic mail control is taken care of by SearchInform Mail Sniffer application. It intercepts all e-mail traffic on the protocol level, so it doesn’t really matter how exactly the e-mail was sent. Full text search by key phrases is conducted not only in the heading and body of the letter, but also in the files attached to it. For instance, this way you can easily track who, how and when tried to send confidential information to the external sources as well as see which of your employees are sending their resumes to the competitors.Besides that SearchInform Mail Sniffer with its powerful search engine and a rich management functional will become an irreplaceable tool in the work of your organization with e-mail boxes.In summary security solutions from SearchInform let you process both open and confidential information while preventing unauthorized modifications and information leak to the outside sources. The system tracks the whole of information flow both on the user computer, in the local network and the information that goes into Internet. This helps to protect the organization from the harm that insiders may cause – a domineering threat, which poses an insurmountable impediment to the proper functioning of any organization and can easily cause havoc in the company’s information management system. Security system from SearchInform Technologies with an inbuilt powerful search module is a new approach to this problem that can rids the enterprise of the headache related to the information leak and disclosure.