Camera police? Apple might soon make it possible to block recording video

Like recording live shows with your iPhone? A new patent granted to Apple details a new method of shutting down such behavior without the owner’s consent

an iPhone camera design capable of receiving infrared signals in order to prevent the illegal recording of events

"An infrared emitter can be located in areas where picture or video capture is prohibited, and the emitter can generate infrared signals with encoded data that includes commands to disable the recording functions of devices,”

civil liberties advocates may still be against the technology due to its ability to shut down the covering of protests by citizens

Source

This is sick. Leave it to Apple to pull this crap. They want the power to disable phones and prevent them from recording any video at various events. Yeah, like that power won't be abused. Next thing we will see is Apple trying to sell this off to every police department and government agency across the country. There won't be any more videos of protests or police shootings, no - because your phones are going to be disabled if you get too close.

This tech had been around for a while.

Imagine it being deployed by police during a protest/ riot. My solution? Go buy an older phone that's not connected to WiFi and use it exclusively as your camera.

and after this news, apple gets another 30 million new customers who blindly give away money for absolutely nothing in return but off-beat colors and clever branding!

i can see people in the music industry backing this move. people like taylor swift and adele, or other massive super stars who hate the idea of sharing or not getting a 'cut' no matter how infinitesimal.

i suspect we will see concepts of this patent being deployed right away, and if its successful, i predict Law enforcements (in the U.S. of A. ) will employ this technology on (against) the public and bring back their credibility and corruption and brutality to where it was in the 90's... the good old days of week long trials, and irrefutable counter evidence against 'eye witnesses', !

a reply to: trollz

I think I saw this news some time ago. I have never and will never buy an apple computer or phone. I did buy an ipod for my daughter some years ago, but that is the only apple product I have ever had in my home.

Android phones are much more under my control.

a reply to: trollz

The opposite is also happening. The government is working on ways to turn on every cell camera and microphone at will so if there is a terrorist event in a location for example they can simply turn on everyone's cameras and microphones and get live feeds from hundreds or thousands of cameras and mic simultaneously. And because we in America are used to signing huge legal documents which we don't read (i.e cell phone user agreements) we have already given them consent to do whatever they want with our devices. The devices are still THEIRS...we just rent the use of them with the condition that we allow them to do whatever they want with our devices (disable features and turn them on at will). Their response? If you don't like it, don't buy our stuff.

originally posted by: Mrgone
This tech had been around for a while.

Imagine it being deployed by police during a protest/ riot. My solution? Go buy an older phone that's not connected to WiFi and use it exclusively as your camera.

That too, as there is tech available to block a lot of cell towers in general. I keep 2 older cell phones charged, for emergencies. One is capable of video. Neither are connected to wi fi.

One is an' obamaphone', has saved my life on a couple of occasions.

Is it now a race between Google/Apple/Facebook to see who can enslave the human race first? Pretty sickening.

Or perhaps it's a hidden united front, that would certainly not surprise me either.

a reply to: truthster013

My user agreement from at&t I have gone over with a fine toothed comb. I have even gotten out of most 'mandatory updates' that drain my battery, take hours, restart the phone 10x- by calling them and saying my phone is not capable of this, turn the update off. They have.

This is old news IIRC.

It hasn't happened and I think if I dig around they've had the patent for a while now.

I have an Apple Watch, iPhone, Macbook Pro, Macbook Air, iPad, Apple TV and Airport Extreme. Of varying ages of course.

Easiest to use, most trouble-free tech devices I've ever owned. I never have to mess with them -- they just work. I've never had to spend time downloading drivers and wondering if they'll conflict with something else. I've never had to worry about spyware or malware. Almost all my software needs come included and pre-installed with the OS.

Apple makes technology that works FOR people, not the other way around. *I* shouldn't have to struggle to get my technology to work for me, because a "one size fits all" operating system is trying to get various components from over a dozen manufactures to work together.

When you have vertical integration of OS and hardware, you eliminate a ton of conflicts and create a much more seamless device interface and experience. Also, with Apple people, most of us are all running on the same version of software so its much easier for app developers. Android and Windows? They're a fractured lot ... so many versions out there...

Well, Apple sure didn't invent this technology for the average consumer and we all know who it potentially benefits, not us. I wonder what Steve Jobs would have thought of this ?

a reply to: MystikMushroom

Glad your having a great experience with your products. '

Having worked countless hours troubleshooting different devices and PC's for many years, I'm leery of anything that just "works." Every piece of software has it's own T&C's and how they access particular devices is worrysome to say the least.

a reply to: trollz

Its an Apple exclusive. Simple solution is to not spend 600$+ on an Iphone. Or as stated, use older phones.

a reply to: JinMI

There's a reason photographers, video editors and musicians use Apple computers.

I shake my head the problems people in my industry have trying to make outboard recording gear work with the Wintel machines.

a reply to: trollz

Another reason not to buy apple products. Will it ever end?

Cheers - Dave

a reply to: trollz

I won't buy any product with this 'feature'.

Screw you Apple.

a reply to: trollz

Maybe I'm wrong on this but, the patent says they will use an infrared emitter to disable recording.

That means an infrared sensor will be needed on the phone to receive this signal, much like one that can be found on almost anything that uses an infrared remote control.

I would guess that a simple piece of electrical tape would circumvent this signal.

Not to give Crapple any ideas but, they would be far better off using an RF emitter or something other than light waves to achieve this.

If I'm right on how this would work, then this is a non-issue cause it would be so easily circumvented.

As for Crapple products, I wouldn't use them if I was paid and my life depended on it.

Also. Don't companies get patents to sue others who use the technology and or suppress technology.

All this being said almost 8 years ago apple got patents for a holodeck and a 3D camera for the phones.

I'm still waiting.

(raises hand, smiles) Guys? There's something like this out there already. It started life as a classified NV goggle blocker (and it still works, oh so well) but they did some testing on camcorders (at the time the big new thing) and it worked for them, too.

Basically, most iris controls will respond to IR. So you pulse very high output IR. The iris thinks it's very very bright and the scene goes dark. Also, most CCDs will respond to near IR anyway, so they white out, what little light gets through. What's left is very muddy patches of light and dark.

For the sound, it was found that a lot of automatic level controls will respond to near ultrasound pulses at high intensity. Adults won't hear anything, kids may hear an irritating tick tick tick sound but audio recorders think the overall sound level is very very high and turn down the mic gain. And again, nothing on the recorder but muffled noise.

a reply to: Bedlam

Hypothetically speaking:
Sounds like something they would "want" to put on classified aircraft to prevent photo ops from curious onlookers.

Hypothetically.







"Why arent there any decent, non blurry photos of ufos anymore?"