For decades, satellites, drones, and human spotters have all played roles in war's surveillance and reconnaissance tools. In an era where inexpensive, internet-connected consumer gadgets are prevalent, militaries now have a powerful new set of eyes: hackable security cameras installed outside homes or on city streets, pointed at potential bombing targets.
On Wednesday, Tel Aviv-based security firm Check Point released research detailing hundreds of hacking attempts that targeted consumer-grade security cameras around the Middle East—many apparently timed to Iran’s recent missile and drone strikes. These camera-hijacking efforts suggest Iran's military has tried to use civilian surveillance cameras as a means to spot targets, plan strikes, or assess damage from its attacks.
Iran wouldn’t be the first to adopt this tactic; earlier this week, The Financial Times reported that Israel had accessed nearly all traffic cameras in Tehran with CIA support. In Ukraine, officials have warned for years that Russia has hacked consumer surveillance cameras to target strikes and spy on troop movements—while Ukrainian hackers have hijacked Russian cameras to surveil their own troops.
Exploiting the insecurity of networked civilian cameras is becoming part of military standard operating procedures: a cheap and accessible means of getting eyes on a target thousands of miles away. According to Sergey Shykevich, who leads threat intelligence research at Check Point,