Facebook’s iPhone app has a new feature – and one that netizens aren't too happy about: it opens the phone’s camera app in the background without your knowledge. A number of users have noticed the unusual behavior and posted videos demonstrating it. In each, the rear camera is clearly turned on and can be seen behind the main …

Iconic camera company Red has upped sticks and quit the smartphone biz following the retirement of its founder Jim Jannard and mobe-fondlers' dismal reception of the firm's first effort, the Hydrogen One. In a statement issued on the Red community forums, Jannard explained the reasons for his stepping down. I have spent the …

An FBI contractor has pleaded not guilty to charges that he installed a camera under a coworker's desk to satisfy his "voyeur" fetish. Joshua Green was working as a contractor in the J Edgar Hoover building – aka the FBI headquarters in Washington DC – last month. On July 26, one of his colleagues, who had just returned to …

ReviewOne of the interesting side effects of being asked to test smart-home technology is that you get grumpier about it. Most folks buying a product like a smart thermostat or socket or lighting or security camera will be excited about its possibilities, imagining scenarios where it will make their lives better, saving time or …

Get ready for the next camera-botnet: a Chinese generic wireless webcam sold under more than 1,200 brands from 354 vendors has a buggy and exploitable embedded web server. According to an advisory by security researcher Pierre Kim this week, the flaws lie within the camera's administration interface – plus the firmware opens …

An insecure web server embedded in more than 35 models of internet-connected CCTV cameras leaves devices wide open to hijacking, it is claimed. The gadgets can be commandeered from the other side of the world with a single HTTP GET request before any password authentication checks take place, we're told. If your camera is one …

VideoThe European Space Agency's ExoMars orbiter has beamed back its first photos and sensor readings of the Red Planet after circling the harsh dust world. The agency's astro-boffins needed some good news: last month, their Schiaparelli Mars lander – which was dropped from the ExoMars craft – smashed onto the Martian surface after …

Robert Graham, CEO of Errata Security, on Friday documented his experience setting up a $55 JideTech security camera behind a Raspberry Pi router configured to isolate the camera from his home network. According to Graham's series of Twitter posts, his camera was taken over by the Mirai botnet in just 98 seconds. Mirai …

Nest has launched its first new product in several years: an outdoor surveillance camera. The Nest Cam Outdoor is effectively a rebuild of its existing Nest Cam designed for the outside. We had an early peek at it and came away with the sense that the company once famed for reinventing the thermostat has found at least some of …

Always looking for a new angle, Nokia has launched itself into the movie equipment business with a 360-degree camera called OZO, capturing stereoscopic 3D video through eight synchronised global shutter sensors as well as spatial audio through eight integrated microphones. Without naming names, Nokia said: “The video can be …

ReviewThese days, it seems like the world and his civil partner has a tablet to offer you, whether it's a bargain basement offering like the Tesco Hudl 2 or something more media-centric, like the Amazon Fire HDX 8. One of the sweet spots for tablet pricing seems to be around the £300–350 range, where you'll expect to get a decent- …

LG and Intel have announced new mobe camera tech which - for once - concentrates on something other than how many little dots you can squeeze into a photo. Intel showed a mobe-friendly version of its Realsense technology at the Intel Developers Forum in Shenzhen. This uses a combination of three cameras to give depth sensing …

FeatureDigital cameras are cheap and convenient. But some people feel they also lack soul, or encourage us all to often to experience life through an LCD screen, firing off hundreds of shots we'll probably never look at, rather than absorbing our surroundings. Film, on the other hand, according to some, can lend itself to a more …

VidAn odd little flaw in the new Raspberry Pi 2 has been discovered just days after its geekgasmic release – the PC doesn't like being papped under the bright lights of cameras. It apparently freezes when a Xenon flash is used to photograph the Raspberry Pi 2. The glitch was flagged up in a forum thread entitled "Why is the Pi2 …

GoPro, the maker of video cameras for those who like to mix danger with their hobbies, has added two new models to its range: the GoPro 4 and and the GoPro Hero. The GoPro 4 follows the GoPro 3, and is available in black and silver editions. Like a posh credit card, the black version is better than the silver one. The black …

GoPro’s shares soared on its stock-market debut, gaining 30.5 per cent to give the wearable camera-maker a market value of $3.9bn. The firm’s clip-on high-def video cameras, beloved of extreme sports enthusiasts and amateur rocket-builders, have become the top-selling camcorders in the world, according to beancounters at IDC. …

Apple has filed a patent application for using "artificial muscle" technology to focus cameras in devices such as its iPhone and iPad, a tech that could allow for slimmer mobile shiny-shiny. Fire up that 'muscle structure' to pull the lens down onto its springy base (click to enlarge) United States Patent Application No. …

Vid + PicsWatch Video It's a traditional tip of the hat today to Tim Middleton of Replay XD for providing a couple of the company's vid cameras for a recent Low Orbit Helium Assisted Navigator (LOHAN) imaging test flight, during which they captured the moment of mighty orb burst in all its glory. The above video speaks for itself, so …