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Technology for Undercover Journalists?
Undercover Journalist asks: "I need to take pictures and video in an area where soldiers/police will try to stop me if they saw what I am doing or/and confiscate my equipment. I need a rig that will allow unobtrusive taking of video/pictures and a way to transmit these images out as soon as I take them. I am thinking on a very small digital camera that can link to a notebook/pda that will spool the stream and use wireless to send the stream to a back-office for emailing it. Preferably, I should be able to script things, e.g. automatic, hand free operation and self-delete of files after transmission. The equipment should be at consumer level pricing. I don't have CIA budgets. I would appreciate thoughts about the kind of rig that would work best."
There is quite a market for wireless cameras and video camera for hobbyists (R/C models and so forth). Have a look at this site for a starting point, and some googling will get a lot more...
h tm
http://www.wirelessvideocameras.com/hobbyequip.
The quality may not be so hot but they're small, lightweight and don't need a lot of battery power. The idea being you could have some sort of 'base station' a mile or so away that receives and records the images and/or video.
http://www.thinkgeek.com/stuff/fun-stuff/59eb.shtm l
Gotta start paying attention to those Slashdot ads!
Its unfortunate that nobody is taking you seriously.
I was interested in this kind of setup back around 1990 when I wanted to do a documentary about the drug trade...but I never did do anything with it.
Anyway, what I was planning at that time was to use one of those really thin fiber-optic lenses with an exchangeable lense video camera. The thinking is the camera goes in a pocket, and the lense goes in the cuff of your shirt or coat sleave under your wrist. You life your wrist and aim, the fiber optics conveys the image to the camera...
They didn' thave exhcangeable lense video cameras then, but they do now. While the XL1 is too bulky to conceal, there is a sony camera with an exchangeable lense-- I think its the PD100. Its pretty small, rugged and designed for documentary work.
Doctors use these things a lot so prices must have come down. You could probably get set up for around $4,000.
That's one idea. I hadn't thought about the webcam type stuff. You might go looking around on the wearhard wearables list for clues. Those guys know small computers.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
You can buy an expensive cell phone with a built-in digital camera -- these are available commercially. They aren't cheap though. A google search should quickly let you know what's out there in that regard.
The cell phone option has the advantage that it's a piece of equipment that's fairly standard, giving you potential diability if caught -- they may not be immediately sure what you are doing.
On the other hand, if you have some cobbled together rats nest of radio and batteries strung through your underwear, it'll be hard to say "where did that come from ?"
There are "stick cameras" about the size of a small twinky bar. This connected to your laptop/pda, and the device dialing over a cell phone connection, may be the way to go. Are you willing to drop up to $1,500 to get it all working ? None of that crap is cheap. And don't expect the pictures to go flying out there as fast you take them, they are really slow connections. It's probably better (in a crowded environment anyway) to have another unsuspicious lookind drop guy in the crowd with his own 802.11 device, picking up the pictures for storage. That way if they grab you and take your shit, all that has to happen is the other guy has to make it out.
If you aren't going for the plausible deniability thing, here are some issues to consider:
-- Is the situation time-constrained ? Do you want pictures from that event in particular, or just random pictures of the area ?
-- How good a resolution do you need ? You can get cameras in the 480x640 pixel range at disposable prices (I mean $30 or so).
-- Is the place typical military tight-ship style, or is it "trashy" and disorganized civilian-style with a lot of people wandering in and out and no one person in charge of the general area ? In other words, can you leave a piece of equipment there for a while and depend on everyone thinking it is someone else's for long enough ?
-- Suppose you only have a short range radio, but a lot of storage -- like a zaurus (or cheap old laptop) with a camera in it. Can you abandon it there and depend on it being "exported" from the location by staff which doesn't check everything ? I.e., disguise it as trash and park accross the street from the dumpster every night for a week or so until you can connect and download everything (the device might not be worth the risk of actually getting out of your car; on the other hand, it can be non-wireless, and you have to depend on getting it.) Or, depending on how sloppy the place is, it may be transported to lost-and-found at the guard shack, helpfully close to the perimeter of the facility, so that you can connect to the device and get want you want without even approaching the security cameras.
-- If it has a lot of memory (hard disk sized) and you have it taking pictures every minute, have it take pictures for several days (or however long is necessary to almost fill it) before hand; it makes it easier to say you wrote the picture script and accidently turned it on and forgot about it.
-- Get your equipment in fairly untraceable way. Buy a laptop used for cash at a store, and if it already has the previous owner's files and etc on it, just leave them. (If you're in Houston check to see if the previous owner worked for Enron or Anderson; some people have made some finds and sold them to Chronicle reporters.)
-- You can make a boot-from-floppy OS (linux or dos, try modifying tomsrtbt) which will capture the pictures and put them on the disk or out on the cell phone modem encrypted, but on boot up after starting the ram disk dd's zeros to the floppy or otherwise munges it, so that when the people find it all they see is a dead floppy in the drive and an innocent win95 installation full of viruses and porn (no kiddie stuff though !)
-- Are the hosts taking there own pictures of the place through their security cameras, or their own designated photographers ? Security shacks are often close to the perimeter of smaller facilities (like an expanded guard shack at the main entreance) and if you can simply look through the window from far away with a telescope at the bank of monitors, sometimes that's cool enough. Then there's those van eck kits, though that might be harder than people say it is (never tried it myself).
-- Here's one that has worked in the past: shoot a several rolls of film (or disposable camera) at an event where you have turn your stuff in to the checked and mailed to you if it's ok. Turn in a couple of rolls to the PR guy to keep 'em happy, and the rest you just put in a FedEx packet addressed to you, and leave it there for some helpful flunky to put in the mail for you.
-- If one part of the event is filmable and one not, just carry your videocamera rolling with another tape in the other hand, flipping it over and over to attract attention to it magician style, so people will presume your camera is empty.
-- Is it the type of place where they check you going in, and then afterwards everybody just walks out with no security ? If so, can you plant your equipment there ahead of time, hidden somewhere, or even just left in plain sight ?
-- if you don't get the stuff out in a wireless fasion, can you burn it to CD or flash memory on the spot, and pass it off to another person, pickpocket style ?
-- Another thing people talk about but doesn't seem to work is getting inside a place, putting your pictures/recordings on a CD that has a program that autoruns to upload it, and just leaving the CD there marked "My XXX collection, vol. 16" and let some looser who works there stick it in his computer and get it out for you.
And one final suggestion -- are you ABSOLUTELY SURE they won't just let you take the pictures ? In plenty of instances, they may refuse at first, but if you present credentials and promise them that some of the pictures will be published then they turn around and let you (ironic that, but everyone wants there 15 minutes). I mean, if it was really secret, they wouldn't let you in at all, right ?
The only exceptions I can think to that would be places were the pictures were being controlled by a publicity monopoly (like a sporting event); maybe a court room or an execution. Executions are surprisingly tough to spy on. Look up on the web one of the most famous spy camera pictures of all time -- an early NY execution of a female in the chair, and some reporter strapped an old box-and-plate type camera to the ankle, and got a double exposure.
Normally cell phones are allowed
In _any_ military environment, the answer to that is no, because it contains an over-the-air transmitter. Two way radios, Furbys, Laptops w/ IR's (some allow the use of masking tape as a cover), 802.11 devices, they're all banned. Likewise to anything that can make a recording -- tape recorders, Furbys, cameras, etc. The exception to these rules are certified devices purchased by the government (ie, gov't laptops, gov't cell phones, gov't purchased cameras, etc)
Lets hope our undercover friend isnt doing undercover work in the military.
I think that I heard an argument like this recently... what was it? Oh yes, if DeCSS was legitimate, it would have a corporation behind it.
As we all know, the good guys always have bank books.
Last I checked, terrorists and industrial spies were the ones who had money. My university newspaper did some undercover work in local restaurants... think that they had money?
I don't understand how someone can say "financial backing == valid" and not get laughed out of the place.
fishy