Now a days everyone of us use Webcam for our daily life uses ranging from distant conferences to keeping in touch with our loved ones. It has been a need which cannot be denied in today’s global village. However today I am not going to write about the ways it helps us in our day to day life. Instead how it can change from a boon to a curse in the flick of a moment.
How Can A Webcam Harm Me?
Suppose you gave your laptop to a repair shop for some purpose and it has a webcam built in it. Now you go and collect it from the shop after a few days. Now there can be two cases, either thne repair boy you gave to is nice and he repairs and gives back to you the laptop, or he can do another thing, which is going to turn your life miserable from now on. What he can do is install some malicious code or some remote management tool. So now what happens is that when ever you get online he can virtually do all the things that you can do in your computer. Including turing on your camera and taking pictures of yours. Guess, what would happen if you kept it on during some private moments of yours. 
It could lead you blackmail or even harassment, which is not at a deserved. Even leaving the above technique, there are several ways in which a webcam can be hacked. A major tool to hack webcam is PRORAT.
How To Protect My WebCam From Getting Hacked?
The first and foremost thing that you should do if you have a external webcam is to connect it to the computer only when it is needed. It may be a bit frustrating, but trust me it can save you from getting your compromising photo from circulating in the web.
If you own a laptop with a webcam built in with it then you should always be aware after getting it back from a repair shop, or a person you can’t trust fully. Check for any suspicious behavior in your computer, and also check in any new software like logmein or any such kind is installed. If you find something immediately uninstall it and get it checked by a trustworthy technical person.
In all the cases do no forget to keep an updated Antivirus in your system as it really bails you out of many tricky situations.
Another trick you can use to protect yourself is that, in many cameras it always makes a noise or shows a notification when it is being started. Do not overlook it in case you hear or see something in case the process was not initiated by you.
If you want to be 100% secure just put the lense cap that comes with the webcam or just put a nice sticker over it, which can be easily removed when needed. This blocks the lense and hence never fails.
It is very important to take these precautions and should not be dealt with lightly, once the miscreant gets your photos there would be no way around. Its better to play safe than be sorry later.
