Tips to secure city video surveillance

BANGALORE, INDIA: Security examination of a working city video surveillance system by Kaspersky Lab has revealed that networks designed to help protect people from criminals and terrorists could be misused by a third party exploiting system configuration flaws.

As part of their research, the authors examined the security video surveillance network in one city. Surveillance cameras were connected via a mesh network – a type of network in which nodes are connected with each other and serve as stepping stones for data (video feed in this particular case) on its way from a node to the control center.

Instead of using a Wi-Fi hotspot or wired connection, nodes in such networks simply transmit data to the closest node which transmits it further through other nodes right to the command center. Should an intruder connect to just a single node in the network, they will be able to manipulate the data transmitted through it.

Mesh-network based video surveillance systems are, in general, an inexpensive alternative to surveillance systems which require either multiple hotspots throughout a city, or miles of wires.

But the security of such networks is heavily dependent on how the whole network is set up.

The researchers shared their findings with the company that had set up the surveillance network in the city last summer. Since then, the necessary changes have been made to the vulnerable network.

In order to avoid the security vulnerabilities associated with mesh-networks,

Kaspersky Lab recommends the following measures:

Although still potentially hackable, Wi-Fi Protected Access with a strong password is the minimum requirement needed to stop the system from being an easy target.

Hidden SSID (public names of a wireless network) and MAC filtering (that allows users to define a list of allowed devices on the Wi-Fi network) will also weed out unskilled hackers.

Make sure that all labels on equipment are concealed and enclosed to deter attackers who do not have insider information.

Securing video data using public-key cryptography will make it almost impossible to manipulate video data.