Quote from: Lucas on July 18, 2020, 08:20:53
Then disable it in the device manager. Why would you want to cover the webcam? What is there to see anyway? The user's face is easier to get using social media..
If security is such a concern then maybe there should be a verison without webcam, microphone and all ports locked as usb devices may also hack the device. The next step would be disabling the Internet entirely because of "security". We should get back to writing on paper and mail pigeons as they won't be tracked so easily..
From information leakage perspective, microphone is a bigger problem. But cameras have a big psychological impact. It's an invasion of privacy. Few people would choose to broadcast what they do even if they just sit around and read a book. It's unlikely someone would do this en masse because it takes too many resources to process the data. Voice is much more feasible. But those cameras can catch a lot. Back in high school, a couple people amused themselves by spying on their classmates via their webcams. It was pretty trivial. And some interesting videos resulted from that. That was before webcams got integrated into laptops and when almost everyone was using desktops. This is mainly about embarrassment. Video typically adds the least value. Unless you want to blackmail. Then it can yield interesting material. Disabling the device in a device manager just makes it a little harder; all you need are high enough privileges to enable it again. There is no way to move a manual physical shutter from the OS. For example, how would you feel about some pedophile watching your child live?
Some companies go to great lengths. And while they typically won't disable networking altogether, they might require you to connect via company VPN and disable direct access to the Internet. Which is a good idea as local networks can be very unfriendly. Even my private laptops are set-up like that and connect via my home network.