IS THE BBC ‘HACKING’ YOUR COMPUTER?

http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSTwc9Hu3cj7XyevlNkvd0FsESstO2M61GIOeHfFykqG_8tKzt1

 

I assume this has an entirely innocent explanation:

Right click on the area of screen playing a video and click on ‘Global Settings’, then click on the ‘Camera and Microphone’ tab and open  ‘Camera and Microphone settings by site’  and this is what you might see…..

 

 

s.ytmg.com is apparently Youtube allowing for interactive video games but why does the BBC need to request  access to my camera and microphone?….though I don’t have any connected for precisely that reason.

 

If you haven’t blocked BBC access….

Whilst you are watching the BBC is the BBC watching you?

 

 

 

 

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21 Responses to IS THE BBC ‘HACKING’ YOUR COMPUTER?

  1. Checkitout says:

    No conspiracy. It’s used for interactive games:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/something-special/games/something-special-outandabout

       7 likes

  2. Rich Tee says:

    It looks like it’s the default setting.

    I’ve got loads in mine – Argos, The Economist, Channel 4, Merriam Webster, greenbatteries.com…

    Mine is set to “Ask me” but I never get asked so presumably they aren’t using it.

       2 likes

  3. Alan says:

    Oh Yes….having said that I have never visited the CBeebies site so I assume it is a default setting that the BBC requests access to camera and mic…..which other BBC sites are interactive?

    I’m sure it’s all entirely innocent.

       1 likes

  4. Jonathan Wilson says:

    Like Rich, mine seems to list a large proportion of sites I’ve visited with an embedded flash, all set to “ask me” but none of them have.

       0 likes

    • pah says:

      That’s because the form in question is raised from the Adobe Flash Global Settings.

      If you go to any web page with embeded Flash then these settings will be accessed by Adobe Flash. It is possible to access these from a web page, rather than Flash, but it is unlikely. You can block which sites accesss these by selecting ‘block site’ or some similarly worded option.

      Trojans however can use these it is possible to turn on your camera remotely provided the access was available, but why would anyone bother? Unless you are Angelina Jolie. You aren’t are you? 😉

         8 likes

  5. Hannibal says:

    ‘I’m sure it’s all entirely innocent’.

    Why the post then?

    I’m afraid to me it screams ‘nutjob!’.

       9 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      What get ‘screamed’, and to whom, is always interesting.
      Alan posed a question and even framed the possibility upfront of there being an innocent explanation.
      Others, more tech savvy than he (or most, I’d hazard) have kindly replied as requested. It would appear it is so.
      You however have come up with the notion that if you don’t know, you shouldn’t ask, and if you do you are a ‘nutjob’. You may be right to be afraid, if not for what you thought.
      I’d be interested in how you react when BBC staff launch into ‘questions being asked’ with things they seek to test.
      On our behalves of course.
      Or is this somehow different… uniquely?
      And how would you feel if the BBC decided to track who ‘you’ are posting, say, here, with who they think ‘you’ may be posting elsewhere, and a ‘you’ who has communicated directly with them?
      Would you feel that is legitimate activity for a public sector service (Not, as such, at GCHQ levels of concern) presumably au fait with data protection issues?
      All just fine, no doubt, as the BBC and how it and its staff behave are really beyond reproach, as anyone with the memory of a mayfly might believe.

         24 likes

    • scoobywho says:

      BBC types appear to have unsavory tastes, better to be safe than sorry.

         12 likes

  6. pah says:

    Alan, I really don’t think the BBC are spying on you but if you are worried disconnect your camera and microphone!

    or block the BBCs access to the camera

    or track access to your PC and repay the complement!

    Keep taking the pills. 🙂

       8 likes

  7. Jeremy Poynton says:

    It’s not the BBC, it’s Adobe.

       2 likes

  8. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Standard Flash player stuff, on which the iPlayer is based. In theory, it could be exploited, but that’s not this.

       3 likes

  9. A Mental Patient says:

    NURSE!!!

    Alan’s out of bed again…

       7 likes

    • Mat says:

      Nurse while you are here can you deal with that mental patient child as he is flinging his doings around to get attention again !!

         3 likes

  10. Guest Who says:

    Whatever else, Alan has certainly managed to tease the next batch out well.
    One can see how a period of enforced bunker time may have proven frustrating, but the opportunity to expand the repertoire appears to have been passed up.

    As Jim Dandy once said… ‘this is a place of civilised debate’. Another memo not seen or read?

       4 likes

  11. jimbola says:

    Maybe Noels House Party is set for a return.

       5 likes

  12. hothandsdave says:

    It’s all very week having laugh at alan’s expense but have you though about how the bbc would deal with this if the hated right wing press websites were doing this but the bbc’s wasn’t? imagine the package on `watchdog`, richard bacon’s outraged barking while you know who wets herself, shaking with indignation?

       14 likes

    • pah says:

      Given the increasing popularity of internet TVs how long before ‘audience reaction’ to programmes is monitored via webcams?

      After all they no longer need to do surveys for audience figures. Sky, at least, know exactly what you watch and when. Which is why a telephone wire fits in the back of the Sky box …

      Or it could just be paranoia?

      Or is that what people are saying I am saying?

      OK which one of you just turned on my bathroom light?

         2 likes

      • Guest Who says:

        Great end credit sequence to a Big Bang Theory, too, with Wolowizard messing with some Chinese guys’ lights.

           2 likes

  13. fitzfitz says:

    … its only for market research, lads : the leftists just need to know what on earth is going on .

       1 likes