Fun with Imou Bullet 2C wifi camera

[April]

I bought a camera for surveilance work . I usually use swan wired stuff but I have been wanting to look at the IP models being sold now to see if I can use them .
Security is everything to me or my name is mud.
I bought an Imou bullet cam 2C on ebay for $50 and proceeded to install it .
Went to android d/l at google and had to log on and pass all tests to get started.
Then I downloaded the app to my desktop which usually works and sat there staring at the screen that told me my d/l would start shortly. Tried it 3 times it never did so I went to my phone followed instructions and got the app onto my phone after a similar number of jump through our hoops sessions.Additionally I had to agree to gps ,file,pics,movies ,contacts,messages etc etc being made public to them before it would install.
So opened the app and then I had to join their club and accept this and that and again had to get a security number from my email and enter it in their box in 60 seconds flat so had 3 tries at that . Getting to webmail can be difficult at times.
Then it had me entering serial number and safety code which I had to get a loupe jewel glass out to read from the item. Got that in and then after some time it decided it could not connect .
Bit further in instructions I found I could scan those codes in from the QCode on the unit. That I did and then it still could not connect.

At that point I had decided it was going back . So i asked for an immediate refund.
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Now there is a more important sinister intention here . These things are made by government owned factories in china. Why would they need exact GPS? Why the demanded access to all parts of my phone? It seems I can put an SD card in it but it must connect to the "CLOUD" as they call it and upload video to them?

When I played with ESP32 and ESP8266 I noticed that all the internal access was being broken out by a Russian guy and made public . The Chinese make them but don't tell you how they work or how to program them. They have a processor and large memory in them that you program code into them like Arduino and similar ATMega,PIC style processor chips. Suspicious I thought at that time many years ago but now I see most of these wifi type of devices all work on ESP chips. Little square tin boxes.

So is this a preparation for war? Or is it just surveillance of their own people? If the chip is in the unit then I think they can use it for all those purposes and probably many many more!

As it stands now I would bet London to a Brick that they can access each individual camera at any time they wish from anywhere in the world.

[Jafadmin]

Pro Tip: Instead of trying to install Chinese cameras, install the GCHQ, or NSA cameras. They're a lot easier to install. They don't have to ask for all that information because they already have it.

[rockedge]

@April you need Zoneminder.

You are correct about the Chinese cams. They phone home. Some dev's at ZM have run across cams one can not prevent from phoning home even with IP isolation. There are tricks to use the cams on isolated local networks or VPN's but many Chinese cameras collect information regardless.

[April]

Pro Tip: Instead of trying to install Chinese cameras, install the GCHQ, or NSA cameras. They're a lot easier to install. They don't have to ask for all that information because they already have it.

Classic . You have a delightful sense of humour.

[April]

@April you need Zoneminder.
You are correct about the Chinese cams. They phone home. Some dev's at ZM have run across cams one can not prevent from phoning home even with IP isolation. There are tricks to use the cams on isolated local networks or VPN's but many Chinese cameras collect information regardless.

Thanks . I have been using Digiwatch for about a decade or more . An old windows version was all I had but it works quite well but there is no Linux version. Its a one off $19 but there are cracks for the older versions.
http://digi-watcher.com/

I did not know about Zoneminder . Perhaps I can get it to run in Puppy . That would be excellent.

Nah I think not . As soon as I see stuff like

Code: Select all

sudo apt install apache2 mariadb-server php libapache2-mod-php php-mysql

I turn away now . It never goes right for me .
I need a pet or sfs to go anywhere near that.

[rockedge]

@April I have a script that can do the entire installation of zoneminder on Puppy Linux Bionic64 and Fossapup64 and with slight modification will work on Bionic32. Uses sc0ttman's Pkg manager to do the heavy lifting. Could possibly work for you and in theory it is a one-click install.

Remove the fake "gz" extension and make executable

01-install-maria_bionic.sh.gz

(962 Bytes) Downloaded 39 times

02-install-zm_bionic.sh.gz

(76.45 KiB) Downloaded 22 times

01-install-maria_fossa.sh.gz

(954 Bytes) Downloaded 30 times

02-install-zm_fossa.sh.gz

(76.5 KiB) Downloaded 35 times

[peppyy]

Wondering if anyone has tried this yet on fossa 64 with a full hd install? I have been wanting to get a wireless camera to keep an eye on my swarm traps and hives. I see on the ZM site that it supports a lot of different cameras and overall has a good rating.

Was hoping to find an appimage since I have good luck with most of those.

[rockedge]

@peppyy I might be able to help you with Zoneminder. You mention a "full install", does this mean Fossapup64 is installed uncompressed in a partition and not in a directory loaded at boot from SFS squash files?

Zoneminder can use just about any camera type. Would you be recording alarmed events? Or mostly observing the live streams?

I have never tried to make it as an app image. Zoneminder is not monolithic and has components in written in several languages plus needs a web server, a MySQL database and PHP to run. Most use Apache as the web server but my scripts use Hiawatha since it is native to Puppy Linux since the beginning and I find it much easier to configure plus remains one of the fastest and most secure of all the web servers available.

I wonder what size such an app image would be to be portable?

[peppyy]

I have fossa64 installed on a partition on one of my ssds . What I mainly want to use it for is to be able to watch a stream from a camera that will view my bee hive and swarm trap.
I have looked at a lot of cameras and reviews and am considering a Hikvision HD EXIR IR 3D-DNR PoE 4mm In/Outdoor Surveillance Security IP Camera.
I have a wifi repeater in the greenhouse nearby that has an Ethernet connector and could put a poe injector next to it. The cable run would be 100 feet +/- so that shouldn't be an issue.

I am pretty sure this camera could be used with VLC but not positive. Been reading so much that I am a little foggy with all the details

[peppyy]

I have the specs for the camera.

[rockedge]

@peppyy While I was asking about some camera ideas over at the ZM dev's channel, one of the dev's has offered that if you need help with ZM, that he is in your timezone. He knows all about your location and the challenges. His name is Steve Gilvarry.

securitywholesalers.com.au CCTV Camera Equipment Supplies Hikvision Dahua Wholesalers

I can of course also help with setting up getting ZM working if your going to use a Puppy or Dog

[peppyy]

@rockedge

I can of course also help with setting up getting ZM working if your going to use a Puppy or Dog

That is my plan, I can't have a Window$ computer for 5 minutes before it is booted to one of my many Puppy disks. Sometimes I shrink the partition and save some of the contents before creating another for Puppy, but most times it is a full wipe and instant Puppy machine with a boot partition and a storage Partition.

Been trying to find some of the older cameras that don't have to be setup with an app. (Don't have anything that would run one), and I prefer to keep my storage local. I am guessing this would do the trick. It has all the Protocols: TCP/IP, ICMP, HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, DHCP, DNS, DDNS, RTP, RTSP, RTCP, PPPoE, NTP, UPnP, SMTP, SNMP, IGMP, 802.1X, QoS, IPv6, Bonjour.

[peppyy]

Well, I finally got the camera, set it up POE. I can login to the camera, set user and password. change any settings I need to. The only thing I can't do is see the video. Tried it several different ways on puppy and Mac. with many browsers and it appears the only way to view the live stream is with a Window$ plugin. Even tried the hints to rstp etc. with vlc from ZM and can't connect. Funny, the configuration screen even has an icon in the corner for vlc.

I can even read the entire manual from the camera, there is always a line of red text in the bottom left of the screen saying "Plugin not detected"

I will plug away at it for a while longer.

[peppyy]

@rockedge Long story short, (As Possible)
The camera streams fine, it is my VLC vetarini that isn't working."satip error: Failed to setup RTSP session" Dragged a link to MVP and there it is. Tried it on my wife's computer and got the same results.
I downloaded and burned a copy of your Tahr with zoneminder and that worked great live. Whatever version of VLC that has worked fine.

Off to find a different VLC for Fossa64.

[joet12345]

^just here to say that VLC once good but not anymore. I have had glitches in windows and linux with it so I left it a while back...

MPV
SMPlayer
SVP for Linux if you have a modern pc: https://www.svp-team.com/wiki/SVP:Linux

I left VLC a while back....my 2 cents.

There are more options in video players but I can't remember then right now...but again, VLC is out of the question for me.

[joet12345]

Here is an interesting link if you have an android phone:

https://app.critter.camera/ (this link only works in android phone)