An opened eye on you: Stealthy video capturer

A stealthy video capturer (SVC), a new video-based spyware, was designed on real 3G smartphones. It can secretly record video information from the built-in camera for the third party, greatly compromising the privacy of smartphone users. Based on the Windows Mobile 5.0/6.0 platform, SVC employs the relevant application programming interfaces (APIs) to control the hardware, such as camera, system monitor, and wireless connection. In the application layer, SVC is composed of three parts, namely, video capture, triggering algorithm, and file sending. The file-sending module sends the video data to remote SVC intenders by practical methods such as e-mail and a multimedia messaging service (MMS). The triggering algorithm is the control module that determines the right time to turn on the video-capture process or send the video information. The process of embedding an SVC in a 3G smartphone is called an infection process. There are three ways for SVC to infect a smartphone, through a Trojan horse, a worm, or a virus.