Camera Shy Hoodie

March 1, 2023 2:19 AM

These technologies are not infallible.’ There are ways that we can push back against them. We don’t just have to accept the status quo. Because the Camera Shy Hoodie uses infrared light, the wearer and anyone nearby will not be able to tell that it’s on. “Night vision security cameras are tuned to see infrared light at night,” Pierce told Motherboard. “So that way they can see in the dark. By shooting enough light back at them, it blows out the sensor and causes the cameras’ auto exposure to try to compensate. Losing definition of the view of the scene. And yeah, making everything inside it unrecognizable.”

Pierce said the hoodie cost about $200 to make and was assembled using mostly off-the-shelf parts. Pierce released all software and plans associated with making the hoodie using a Creative Commons license and open-sourced the code used to operate it.

posted by Bottlecap (37 comments total)

A step closer to the 'scramble suits' from 'A Scanner Darkly' ...
posted by GallonOfAlan at 2:25 AM on March 1, 2023 [3 favorites]

Does this technique work on most cameras, or only night-vision security cams? Seems likely to be more effective on cheap security cameras than on Special Branch.
posted by pompomtom at 3:17 AM on March 1, 2023

This is ancient tech that's been around for ages. Like Mondo 2000 ages ago. A few infra-red LEDs and a battery, like $30 total.
posted by zengargoyle at 3:29 AM on March 1, 2023 [16 favorites]

I think there's a similar thing that some celebrities use to thwart paparazzi; at least I heard Daniel Radcliffe talking about it once. It's a jacket that apparently reacts with a camera flash in such a way that it reflects all the light from the flash onto everything around it, so all you see in the picture is a vast white field with the jacket sort of floating in mid-air.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:18 AM on March 1, 2023 [2 favorites]

zengargoyle has it. There is something particularly weird about this topic, though, in that this same idea pops up every two years or so on hackaday or whatever and no one seems to have any recollection of the previous iteration. Maybe IR light degrades memory? [fires up arxiv]

(prepares to make same post about memory-erasing hoodie every day for next six years)
posted by phooky at 4:45 AM on March 1, 2023 [14 favorites]

this same idea pops up every two years or so on hackaday

Exactly what I thought. I feel like I've seen articles/posts about anti-paparazzi clothing every couple of years as if we're all being chased by a flash-equipped mob of a photographers, or anti-face-recognition makeup. I'm wondering if these things are the end result of some art school syllabus that gets a new crop of students every couple of years.

At least these anti-surveillance-camera ones would theoretically be useful to a larger portion of the population.
posted by msbrauer at 5:08 AM on March 1, 2023 [13 favorites]

I thought Daniel Radcliffe foiled the paparazzi by wearing the same clothes all the time so there was no way to tell one set pics from another.
posted by Billiken at 5:26 AM on March 1, 2023 [14 favorites]

This is ancient tech that's been around for ages. Like Mondo 2000 ages ago. A few infra-red LEDs and a battery, like $30 total.

And it didn't work then, either.

This stuff sort-of works on very cheap cameras, do not count on it to protect you from corporations that take security seriously, or from the state.
posted by mhoye at 5:27 AM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

I thought Daniel Radcliffe foiled the paparazzi by wearing the same clothes all the time so there was no way to tell one set pics from another.

By wearing the same outfit every day for months, he effectively drove the price of his own image to zero, and there's a valuable lesson here: it's always more effective to undermine the economics than it is to undermine the tech.
posted by mhoye at 5:30 AM on March 1, 2023 [63 favorites]

The "anti-paparazzi" clothing looks like stuff made from the same reflective material that cyclists have used for years and years to increase their visibility at night. I mean, I guess that making a jacket with lapels for a dressier effect is something.
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:30 AM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

Daniel Radcliffe foiled the paparazzi by wearing the same clothes all the time

Britney Spears did the same thing around 2013.
And Princess Diana wore the exact same workout clothes to the gym every day for the same reason.
posted by Lanark at 5:39 AM on March 1, 2023 [11 favorites]

It took me damn near fifteen years to ever-so-slowly worm my way past my wife's calm and reasonable defenses, but this year for Christmas she got me a new wallet, and WITHOUT ME EVEN HAVING TO ASK, she got me the one that's a Faraday cage because people shouldn't be able to remotely scan your passport and junk. Passive countermeasures, sure, but it shows I'm making progress.

So I think my point here is, if I'm going to wear one of these things out in public, the time to tell me about it was right in the middle of Clinton's second term.
posted by Mayor West at 5:58 AM on March 1, 2023 [5 favorites]

I'm also curious about whether this thing can defeat regular old cameras, too. I would think night-vision cameras would be much more vulnerable to high-intensity IR flashes, because no one's seen a need to invest in ones that are hardened against them, yet. (Key word: yet.) But if you want your camera to work outdoors, it needs to be able to pick up a frame or two of the glowing yellow orb in the sky without self-immolating, which makes me think the engineers at Vice News might not have a plan for universal DIY countermeasures.
posted by Mayor West at 6:05 AM on March 1, 2023

I don't know about video cameras, but a lot (most?) of DSLRs have IR filters over the sensor. So it wouldn't be effective for them. (Astrophotographers get theirs removed.) I think this would only work for night vision cameras.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 6:11 AM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

I thought Daniel Radcliffe foiled the paparazzi by wearing the same clothes all the time so there was no way to tell one set pics from another.

Yes, that's what he did. He just talked about the reflective jacket.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:13 AM on March 1, 2023

I'm also curious about whether this thing can defeat regular old cameras, too.

It can't. This is the high-school drama club's version of security theatre.
posted by mhoye at 6:27 AM on March 1, 2023 [4 favorites]

Surveillance. It is exactly why I took the tracking out of the clickable URL provided "?utm_source=vice_facebook&utm_medium=social". Innocuous in itself but pervasive and intrusive in noting what you click and where you go...
posted by IndelibleUnderpants at 7:22 AM on March 1, 2023 [3 favorites]

“I hope the people who . . . [have] a good reason to, you know?” Pierce said. “I want them to be able to protest without repercussions. I think that’s the ideal use case for it.”

I sympathize with this, but also getting strong Law of Unintended Consequences vibes as well.
posted by snwod at 7:24 AM on March 1, 2023 [2 favorites]

I took the tracking out of the clickable URL provided "?utm_source=

The ClearURLs Firefox extension will do this for you
posted by Lanark at 7:33 AM on March 1, 2023 [6 favorites]

Lanark - Thanks for highlighting that. I already use this and other tools (e.g. noscript) and it is wonderful. I was merely pointing out the pervasive nature of tracking and surveillance.
posted by IndelibleUnderpants at 7:45 AM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

I would think, for all his work, Daniel Radcliffe should have been given the cloak of invisibility.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 7:48 AM on March 1, 2023 [8 favorites]

I saw this on Hacker News, and someone there pointed out that it really only works assuming that the security folks are looking at recordings. If it's a live situation, the hoodie's a big neon "look at me" sign, assuming that it works at all.
posted by Spike Glee at 7:58 AM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

It's a jacket that apparently reacts with a camera flash in such a way that it reflects all the light from the flash onto everything around it, so all you see in the picture is a vast white field with the jacket sort of floating in mid-air.

Retroreflectors.

I sympathize with this, but also getting strong Law of Unintended Consequences vibes as well.

Honestly, this just feels like it was designed to defeat those home security cameras to used to watch your Amazon shipment vanish.
posted by pwnguin at 8:14 AM on March 1, 2023 [2 favorites]

Out of curiosity, does anyone know where the bottleneck stopping us from wearable tech that actually DOES blind surveillance currently sits? Is it the overlapping wavelengths between "this light will blind sensors" and "this light will harm human eyes"? Is it battery life from running the equivalent of running the light board of a surgical operating theater? Weight of components? Cost?

I need to know what to look into, so I can buy all the required parts before they're suddenly illegal finish my cyberpunk novel.
posted by Mayor West at 8:42 AM on March 1, 2023 [2 favorites]

. . . she got me the [wallet] that's a Faraday cage because people shouldn't be able to remotely scan your . . . junk.

I agree, but for this to work you have to keep your wallet in your font pocket right?
posted by The Bellman at 8:57 AM on March 1, 2023 [6 favorites]

I thought Daniel Radcliffe foiled the paparazzi by wearing the same clothes all the time so there was no way to tell one set pics from another.--Billiken

I've heard another technique is to wear clothes with lots of branding on them--basically walking advertisements. The pictures aren't worth much if they have to blur all your clothes.
posted by eye of newt at 9:42 AM on March 1, 2023

Much more effective to simply wear the discarded faces of my enemies.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 9:58 AM on March 1, 2023 [6 favorites]

Fun... Can I rewrite the controller software to change traffic lights, or shut off TV's?
posted by Marky at 11:14 AM on March 1, 2023

Uh... why not a wide brim hat with a veil? This isn't France so that's not illegal is it?
posted by aleph at 12:21 PM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

For those who have an interest in not being seen, there is the classic[SLYT] and then there is the light bending material HyperStealth makes. Neither is terribly practical, but both sure are fun to look at.
posted by Ignorantsavage at 12:48 PM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

Identifying people by their walk is the big thing now, so perhaps the issue of defeating surveillance should be turned over to ballet dancers or mimes.
posted by betweenthebars at 3:02 PM on March 1, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'm also curious about whether this thing can defeat regular old cameras, too.

My understanding is that most camera sensors are sensitive to near-infrared light, and a lot of manufacturers don't bother to add IR filters even if they aren't meant for low-light conditions, so I'd imagine this works in a lot more places than it doesn't. But yeah, it's not going to be something you can 100% rely on either.
posted by Aleyn at 5:09 PM on March 1, 2023

it's always more effective to undermine the economics than it is to undermine the tech.

Fascinating idea. How does it apply to a Big Brother-style government hellbent on watching everyone everywhere?
posted by bryon at 6:46 PM on March 1, 2023

"Identifying people by their walk is the big thing now, so ..."

I've always heard it's simple to change your walk => put some small stones/beads in the toe of your shoes. It slows you down but that also is a change.
posted by aleph at 9:34 AM on March 2, 2023

Security cameras with "true day/night" move their IR filters out of the way when they turn on their IR illuminator to capture better images. I can hear it click on my cheap Dahua dome cam.

Visible light cameras with missing or cheap "hot mirror" IR blockers can be overwhelmed with strong IR, but the device in the fine article is really intended for night use. During the day, wear a respirator, sunglasses & headphones or hood to conceal the ears, which are like a fingerprint (thanks Great Brain).
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 10:00 AM on March 2, 2023 [1 favorite]

I guess we all have to learn that arrhythmic worm walk or whatever from Dune. We have to wear still suits too. And drink our pee and sweat. Combat Big Brother and confront climate disaster (Big Mother?) in one go.
posted by Don.Kinsayder at 2:54 PM on March 2, 2023 [1 favorite]

I've settled on defeating surveillance by being the most boring old guy in the world. I glide through the world unnoticed like an awkward uncle at thanksgiving that everyone ignores. It's a pain the once or twice a decade when I actually want attention but that's a largely unnoticed sacrifice I'm willing to make.

I've always heard it's simple to change your walk => put some small stones/beads in the toe of your shoes. It slows you down but that also is a change.

Just get old. The randomly generated pain of the day that comes free with your AARP card will keep your walk highly variable.
posted by srboisvert at 7:44 AM on March 7, 2023 [1 favorite]