Anker owned Eufy has finally responded to the concerns a lot of people have had regarding the security of its cameras and the use of the cloud. The company has used the cloud for a while which it says it uses to help send push notifications to users more reliably. Eufy says it uses a secure AWS server to facilitate these services.
Using the cloud is ok, a lot of companies do it. However, the main crux of the issue here is that Eufy has made multiple marketing claims and statements on its website advertising the fact that there is no cloud element to using these cameras. In a statement which is pasted below, Eufy says it does now acknowledged that it has been lying to customers, but fails to apologise for doing so.
Statement from Eufy:
“eufy Security Uses the Cloud to Send Users Mobile Push Notifications
This is true. As mentioned earlier, eufy Security is committed to reducing the use of the cloud in our security processes wherever possible. However, some processes today still require us to use our secure AWS server.
For example, in the case of security push notifications – when the user has chosen to include a thumbnail with that security notification – a small preview image of the security event is sent to our secure AWS server and then pushed to the user’s phone. This image is protected through end-to-end encryption and is deleted shortly after the push notification has been sent. This process also complies with all industry standards.
No user data has been exposed, and the potential security flaws discussed online are speculative. However, we do agree there were some key areas for improvement. So we have made changes.”
When Paul Moore, the initial security researcher uncovered the issues that many have been raising issues about, he found that images were stored unencrypted. Another user even found that by just using VLC player, it was possible to view the feed from a camera, again unencrypted.
Eufy could have avoided a lot of these issues. If it really want to become a ‘cloud-less’ company, follow in the steps of Eve. Eve have managed to build a business on not using a cloud and instead, for its cameras just using HomeKit Secure Video which takes care of the notifications, storage and more. Unfortunately, these actions have made some users double take their purchases and move to other platforms, such as Eve or something more professional, like UniFi Protect from Ubiquiti.
