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Image of a home surveillance camera from a criminal case in the UK

Photo: Essex Police / dpa

Several thousand Wyze camera users may have been shocked when they opened their emails over the weekend. The provider of surveillance cameras for home use reported in a message about a "security issue" that resulted in 13,000 cases of recordings from their cameras being displayed in someone else's Wyze account. Around 1,500 users clicked on the corresponding third-party recordings. Sometimes they would have been able to see a preview image, but sometimes they would also have been able to see one of the actually private videos.

The data breach occurred when Wyze cameras went back online after being down for several hours last Friday evening German time. The reason for this was problems with a third-party provider, according to the company's email, which various US media outlets consistently quoted. Wyze apologized for the “disappointing news.”

Real-time monitoring of your own cats

Anyone who buys a camera from Wyze usually wants to use it to monitor either the interior or the entrance area of ​​their home in real time. Some people use small surveillance cameras because they think they can protect themselves from burglars or to keep an eye on their house when they are out and about. Others use them to film their pets when they are away.

This is exactly what a 23-year-old said she used her camera for. As she reported on Reddit, she was also affected by the incident. She posted a screenshot of the email from Wyze. It said that in her case, camera footage appeared to have been viewed by someone else.

The user wrote that she was getting ready for work and changing clothes while the camera was out. The camera failure occurred on the west coast of the USA in the morning hours. "I feel so hurt," the woman wrote. She was shocked, had already deleted her account and also complained to the company.

Wyze has had to deal with individual security incidents in the past. Last September, the company confirmed reports from individual users that they were seeing camera footage from other people, as “The Verge” reported. According to the portal, the company could face lawsuits due to the current incident. The apology sent by email may not be enough to avert this.

hp