Spy-cam detectors: Sweeping away the myths
According to AsiaOne News:
ON TV cop shows, they work like magic, beeping every time they detect cameras hidden in walls, the ceiling or household appliances.Across the Causeway, sales of these camera detection devices, also known as sweepers or bug detectors, have recently shot up after then-Malaysian Health Minister Chua Soi Lek was secretly filmed during a hotel tryst.
Demand here, however, has not picked up and experts also warn against putting too much faith in these devices.
Private investigators and technology experts speaking to The Straits Times said the camera detectors are limited in their ability to foil surreptitious filming.
Sweeping away some of the myths, they say that for one thing, such devices are only useful in detecting wireless cameras.
After filming, these cameras transmit the video wirelessly to someone spying in the next room. The signals are what give away the hidden camera.
The detectors sniff out cameras by picking up the presence of such signals.
These counter-spying gizmos cost between $60 and $180 at stores in Sim Lim Square, a check by The Straits Times showed.
Mr Lee Tat Cheng, a surveillance expert who has worked on legal cases, said these gadgets cannot detect wired cameras, which do not transmit any data over the air.
Unlike wireless cameras, they usually store video on an attached memory card or transmit data over a wire to a recorder.
Most serious spying is done with such cameras.
Private investigator Lionel de Souza, who is a retired police officer, said wired cameras are preferred for their reliability and clearer pictures.
‘With wireless operated cameras, even if you just turn on the TV set or computer, the camera’s functions can be affected,’ he said.
Most good wireless cameras are also hard to detect.
Private investigator Dennis Lee, from Covert Acquisition, said professional surveillance cameras are more sophisticated, and will use frequency ranges not easily detected by the cheaper camera detectors.
‘Those at Sim Lim are just fun gadgets. Proper bug sweepers are very expensive,” he said.
A basic sweeping device can cost about $700, while more advanced ones can cost up to $38,000.
These are typically used by the military or police to ‘clean up’ hotel rooms before very important politicians check in.
For the paranoid or suspicious in Singapore, there is also another problem – equipment might require a licence if it uses radio frequencies that fall in the restricted band under the Telecommunications Act.
But Mr Lee says there is another way to sweep a room: You can use signal receivers – the devices that eavesdroppers use to pick up transmissions from their wireless cameras.
Simply plug the receiver into the room’s television set, and you can pick up the same signal being surreptitiously beamed to a would-be spy.
Where technology cannot help, Mr De Souza recommends doing it the old-fashioned way.
‘When you enter a hotel room, always check the TV set in the room. If there is a radio set, check that too, and the flower vase and lampstand,’ he said.
‘If you see any suspicious dots on the ceiling, run your hand over it and use something to jab it.’
- Do check out hotels with those ceiling that look suspiciously cut out…or broken. The air-conditional may have holes that can hide such cameras.
