User:Ms7821/Security theatre: Difference between revisions

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Revision as of 20:45, 11 August 2011

Background

Currently webcams are easy to access on any device, simply by knowing the URL.

This is a cause of concern for some members, for some/all of the following reasons:

  • People just don't like webcams
  • It's difficult to justify the loss of privacy to visitors
  • Temptation to use the webcams to work out why something happened
  • Imbalance of power - those in the space don't necessarily know who can see them

Note that the last two are seen by some as advantages, due to their deterrent effect.

The following people requested for it to be members only

Names given are common username and email name.

Montyphy Ciarán
TheHypnotist Morris
SamLR Sam Cook
layer1gfx Chris
SheraDreaming Lauren
roberthl Robert Leverington
liedra Catie Flick
Tom Newsom Tom Newsom
Kal Kal
HaywardGB Lee Hayward
steeeve Steve McKellan
wzdd Nicholas FitzRoy-Dale
The following people requested it be left public
Renski Darren McDonald
ms7821 Mark Steward
dmi David Ingram
Paul2 Paul Dart
elliot_w Elliot West
solexious Charles Yarnold
earthshine Mike McRoberts
srimech Jim MacArthur
dirkx Dirk-Willem van Gulik
tajasel Katie Sutton
tomwyatt Tom Wyatt
Phil Phil Roy
v21 George Buckenham
varoudis Tasos Varoudis
creature Alex Pounds
actel PJ Barry
billy Billy Smith
JennyH Jenny
Spike Chris Foote
Nokomis Clare Greenhalgh
AJP AJP
asc Steve
The following people requested a new shareable URL
Sunkzero Darren Hubbard
eb4890 Will Pearson
Eithin Sam Kelly
TheHypnotist Morris
gausie Sam Gaus
Kal Kal

Implementation of limiting to members

I hope rearranging the cameras will be enough, but if not, here's how the members-only limit might work without causing too much disruption:

  • Logged in user visits webcam page
  • Auth cookie is checked; user is given a long-lived cookie with auth details
  • User is redirected to current URL with key (random)
  • Current URL with key can be distributed

Periodically, current URL changes

  • When current URL key is wrong, long-lived cookie is checked and user reauthenticated
  • If user is still active, user is redirected to current URL with key
  • If not, user is invited to ask on IRC


This of course does nothing to protect against a member who shares their password, forwards the streams, or writes an API to make the URL available to the wider world. But it does mean we can graph how often the links are shared with outside members.

  • We don't currently know that the cameras are EVER viewed by nonmembers (other than transiently, by invitation, which this implementation is designed to still support). How about investigating this first, before bothering to set all that up ? Logging IPs would do as a first cut, then see whether it needs to be refined.