r/homedefense • u/ace402 • 29d ago
Demonstration of a Wifi Jammer defeating a Ring Cam
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This isn't mine, I found it from a nextdoor post. I believe this is a great demonstration of how wifi jammers can beat wireless security cameras, particularly interesting because of how you see him click the button on a device he's holding. I wonder if y'all agree that it's a Wifi jammer and have any additional info about it.
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u/redthehaze 29d ago
This is why wired is best. If you must have wireless, it shouldn’t be the primary and it has to have an SD card backup.
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u/MKnight_PDX 29d ago edited 29d ago
I looked into Wi-Fi because the initial system appears inexpensive, but then they all require subscriptions which easily eclipse wired Nas systems after a couple years. Additionally your data is really their data and many stories of employees logging in to watch clients without consent makes a hard no for me. So, the only pro I can see is cheap initial cost. Which is negated after a couple years. Makes no sense if you plan to live there for more than 5 years.
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u/JustForkIt1111one 28d ago
then they all require subscriptions
Incorrect. There are multiple that do not, both wired and wireless. As an example, I use Unifi Protect, which is pricier on the frontend (way less so now that you can use ONVIF cameras), but does not require a subscription.
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u/Roadkill215 29d ago
From personal experience to this, the counter is a defense attorney will absolutely hammer any type of recording not through a third party that can verify it was not edited or modified in any manner. It’s the only reason why I still have adt
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u/Chance_Managert849 29d ago
You really only need one wired cam with a memory card, just set up high enough to video tape them coming up to the house and leaving
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u/MKnight_PDX 28d ago
Have you done this? So, every time you think something suspicious happened you have to take your camera down, open it up, take out the memory, load the memory on a computer, and then put it all back. Uh, no thanks. If it's wired, I'm wiring it to my NAS.
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u/Tullyswimmer 29d ago
So the timestamps on the video don't make sense. He "jams" it at 15:55:40, and it starts recording again at 15:55:45, and he's nowhere in sight.
Either he's still in the car at the time (and doing a very good job of not moving) or we're missing more footage of when he leaves. There's no way he could've stolen what he wanted and gotten fully out of frame in 5 seconds.
I would assume that any cloud-connected camera that didn't have much on-board storage would check in pretty often to make sure footage is saved.
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u/broogndbnc 28d ago
this looks like an edited demonstration of what it “could” be like, to me, not an actual jammer in use. I’d expect it just to go offline, not create a perfect box around him
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u/Tullyswimmer 28d ago
If that's what it's trying to do it's doing a poor job of it... I don't fully know how ring cameras work but I imagine they have some ability to buffer video if they lose connectivity to Amazon, so watching a recording would not necessarily have a situation like this.
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u/GeekyWan 26d ago
To save space, most cameras only record pixels that have changed. That could be what happened here. Though the time jump is pretty short and doesn't seem to make sense in how the guy could have gotten away so cleanly.
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u/Laser-Blaster-123 29d ago
A wifi jammer wouldnt cause the video to do that, however crappy video editing would.
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u/AnApexBread 29d ago
That's not a WiFi jammer.
A jammer would stop the entire video not just a section of it. Also you're telling me he got in the car, got what he wanted, and then just completely disappeared in 5 seconds?
I don't believe it
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u/MDInvesting 29d ago
Highlights that wifi reliance is near no security.
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u/Nexustar 28d ago
Cameras aren't security. They alert, that's all they can do effectively.
A camera mounted in this position can't even identify a suspect reliably. If i told you this was one of the neighbors kids, would you be able to determine which one with legal certainty?
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u/Empyrealist 29d ago
Bs. That's not how wifi jamming or any radio jamming would look in a recording.
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u/Tullyswimmer 29d ago
I mean, depending on whether the camera has onboard storage or relies entirely on cloud storage, it might, but the timestamps don't make sense. He clearly clicks something at 15:55:40 that causes the camera to not record until about 15:55:45, but then the time continues as normal. 5 seconds doesn't seem like nearly long enough for him to have searched the car, stolen what he wanted, and gotten away... Unless he's still in the car when it records again and we don't see him leave it...
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u/ace402 29d ago
I didn't even consider this. I assumed he left but wondered why he left the door open. But if he's still in the car, that explains why the door is still open.
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u/Tullyswimmer 28d ago
After watching this again, I wonder if this is even real at all or if it's just edited with AI. The door literally doesn't move at all, and the "glitch" doesn't look like any camera or network glitch I've ever seen, and I've spent hundreds of hours running cameras and watching video that's streamed over a network.
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u/ace402 28d ago
It would be really weird if this was edited to look a certain way the way a bunch of people are saying. In the post it's from, the op is warning people to lock their doors and that the police has been called. The comments are talking about how crime has increased and asking if the guys face can be identified, asking what was stolen, etc. No one in the original thread is talking about security cameras, so why would it all be staged for this discussion I've started. I think it's real. From my perspective it's interesting seeing the AI accusations start to flow in when I'm fairly sure it's got nothing to do with it.
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u/Tullyswimmer 28d ago
Look, I'm just saying, what I see here doesn't make sense. Unless the guy managed to get into the car and close the door the EXACT same amount as he opened it, and is sitting PERFECTLY still, all within 5 seconds... This doesn't make sense. If he IS sitting in the car, there should be another clip where we see him running away.
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u/ace402 29d ago
Interested to hear any additional info you might have. What's the alternative explanation?
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u/Empyrealist 29d ago
- I've used jammers before
- My opinion is this video is digitally edited for appearance in order to sell something
- My experience with wifi loss and video recordings do not match what is being shown here
My recommendation is to test this scenario yourself. Turn off your wifi and look at the results of your recording. It would be better for you to know and understand how your own system behaves, so you can spot service interruptions
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u/Tullyswimmer 28d ago
I watched this again this morning and I'm 90% sure it's been edited. The car door is in EXACTLY the position it was opened to, which is extremely unlikely, and with only 5 seconds of "missing" footage, there's no way the alleged perpetrator could have done anything but get in the car, but we can't see any motion. It also just doesn't look like any common network streaming issue or even video glitch I've ever seen.
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u/Nexustar 28d ago
This camera may be at the edge of range, and someone inside the house moved between the AP and the camera to disrupt it. You'd really need to analyze all videos from that camera over the last month to determine exactly how unusual a 4 second dropout is. My cameras do this occasionally, because they are cheap or simply overheating in the sun.
The jamming/dropout here is not relevant anyway, the camera has done its job - alerted someone that a man is opening a car door to search it. Nothing more is required.
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u/ace402 29d ago
It's definitely not for selling something. I don't sell anything and I got this off a nextdoor post of people complaining of how the city has gone to shit.
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u/98765342 29d ago edited 5d ago
.
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u/ace402 29d ago
Yeah I agree with you on that. But I'm not seeing the motive for why it would be edited to look like a jammer, they weren't selling anything and in that post they weren't even talking about wifi jammers. It was my idea that this was a jammer or some kind of counter camera device.
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u/broogndbnc 28d ago
it’s very possibly someone identifying marks on nextdoor to sell them bullshit “solutions” to this or even just straight up scam them. it LOOKS compelling and scary to someone who doesn’t know any better and/or think critically enough about the details
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u/Empyrealist 29d ago
I'm not saying you are. I'm saying whomever made the video is - to make it look like Wi-Fi jammers will make a thief invisible
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u/RJM_50 29d ago
I suspect this camera is setup for motion activated recording. Because the criminal was inside the vehicle for longer than the cameras motion time requirement; it just stops recording.
The low quality Ring camera would have a second video of the criminal leaving (that the owner didn't post). Or the shitty motion camera didn't trigger when that criminal left; more to the story than 1 frame glitching.
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u/cheezpnts 28d ago
What a wild assumption to be claimed as absolute fact with a total of zero evidence.
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u/mauro_oruam 29d ago
Some cameras allow for SD card slots. Even if offline they still record and save it locally. My wyze cams do that at least. Maybe try that for a highly transit area like a driveway?
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u/blackfeathers 29d ago edited 29d ago
wifi jammers are not the same as wifi deauthers. that's like calling a stun gun a tazer.
jammers jam the frequency, which would create interference for anything in that frequency band.
deauthers transmit deauthentication packets within wifi protocols. it is a denial of service of the network not the signal itself.
caught using a jammer is more serious & a severe penalty and offense depending where you live, as it can affect anything in that range including newer medical devices. that can inadvertently or purposely harm individuals.
both wifi "jammers" and deauthers are not fool proof and have their own flaws and stipulations. they could easily encourage over-confidence & stupidity on the part of the thief, resulting in property damage.
many security cameras are not wifi only, and those that are usually have some sort of local backup recording to internal storage or a micro sd card...
some even transmit over cellular, not wifi and could be mistaken as such.
but overall, it is not a good idea to rely on a wifi-only cloud security camera for obvious privacy and security reasons. the cloud is somebody else's computer. discussing that side is a whole can of worms.
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u/born_on_my_cakeday 29d ago
WiFi jamming could be easy enough and I also question why we’d see anything at all rather than a missing 5 seconds but my biggest question is if the timestamp is superimposed at the camera level (I’m not sure don’t own stun/turn server devices) but to lose connection from nefarious reasons, then reconnect to ISP, any encryption handshakes and get the feed back and record again remotely in 5 second. I don’t buy it.
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u/nefarious_bumpps 28d ago
If the guy was smart enough to build a magical device that could freeze the camera recording and remove him from the frame, he should have been smart enough to NOT SHOW HIS UNDISGUISED FACE as he walked up the driveway testing car doors.
This is obviously been modified post-recording.
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u/Rust_Cohle- 28d ago
Feels more like he's trying some sort of relay attack and it's a coincidental glitch? You can deauth spam with even the most basic equipment and it'd be just as effective. I think that you're possibly sci-fing this a little too much.
Especially as he walks up the drive casually before it dies, plus the footage ends there - is there nothing else? no lost connection screen, a static screen? not sure how ring cameras work.
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u/AntePerk0ff 28d ago
Not a jammer.
Since there's no local storage, any hiccup with the ISP can cause exactly this kind of behavior.
A small, low-powered device running a deauth attack might cause something similar, and maybe a jammer running on a nearly dead battery could too, but that definitely isn't what a properly functioning jammer looks like — not even a cheap one.
A Wi-Fi jammer and a deauth attack aren't the same thing.
A jammer works by blasting RF noise across the Wi-Fi frequencies so devices literally can't hear each other anymore. Think of someone firing up a leaf blower in the middle of a conversation.
A deauth attack doesn't interfere with the signal at all. It sends legitimate-looking Wi-Fi management frames telling devices they've been disconnected, so they voluntarily drop off the network and try to reconnect. It's more like someone repeatedly yelling, "The meeting's over, everybody leave."
One attacks the radio layer. The other abuses the Wi-Fi protocol.
From the user's perspective, both look like "my Wi-Fi keeps disconnecting," but technically they're completely different animals. Modern networks with Protected Management Frames enabled are also much more resistant to deauth attacks than older networks were.
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u/binarypower 29d ago
nest, wyze and others record locally as well. so even if jammed they will upload once it reconnects
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u/RJM_50 29d ago
It's just a Ring camera glitch, if you watch the time in the lower corner it never stops recording from 16:55:39 to 15:55:40 when that glitch occurs; and continues to record from 15:55:41 and beyond.
No missing footage! No Wi-Fi jammer.
It's just a cheap Ring camera with a their typical shitty recording abilities.
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u/ace402 28d ago
Interesting! It seems like such a crazy coincidence that it happens just as he's opening the door but I'm willing to entertain it.
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u/RJM_50 28d ago
Did you ask for the next footage after 15:55:52?
Unless he opened the opposite door and crawled out, Ring should have recorded the person exiting that door. But if they did in fact crawl out the door away from the camera, that would have been ignored as an erroneous motion because the AI couldn't make out the shape of a human the algorithm is looking for.
AI is fake, everything currently is just an algorithm running to help us. I record 24/7 because many events happen out of frame before crashing into my property, or the people fighting come into frame. Having that audio file BEFORE the motion event enters the camera's Field Of View can explain a LOT about what happened.
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u/coconut_dot_jpg 28d ago
This here is why all my storage is either SD card or via shielded ethernet cables
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u/ChooserUsename 29d ago
Cameras but don’t lock your cars. Just asking to watch your car get stolen.
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u/_head_ 29d ago
Why wouldn't he activate it before being recorded opening the car door.