Is there such a thing as an app-free IP camera any more?

[sirwumpus@tilde.zone]

@mwl

I have an old D-Link DCS-942L Camera that works like this, but its certs might be out of date now. It also emails stills or short videos if there is activity or sound (and works in the dark too). No app. YEAH!

[bpl@snac.bsd.cafe]

I bought such camera, accessible through web browser, Android app or Windows desktop app.

[eltonfc@bertha.social]

@mwl only if you code an esp32-cam yourself.

[chris@nutmeg.social]

@mwl I briefly looked into this when I got cameras a few years back, it seemed like I needed RTSP, which led me to use Reolink. But, even still they had me use an app to set it up. Maybe industrial-grade cameras would be more likely to not require the app non-sense.

When I moved from wifi IoT devices to zigbee devices I was really happy with not needing an app for those. There's gotta be something like that for cameras.

[viq@social.hackerspace.pl]

@mwl I've heard that people dealing with Home Assistant are quite happy with Reolink cameras. AFAIK able to work fully locally, I don't know if they have something that you can point a browser at, or you need something that understands rtmp.
Also https://docs.frigate.video/frigate/hardware may give some ideas.

[sebastian@social.itu.dk]

@mwl

yes, plenty, look at the #ONVIF standard. i think that s what you are looking for (?).
these cams might *also* come with an app, but no need to use it.

https://www.onvif.org/conformant-products/

at the cheap end of the spectrum, many tp-link cams (vigi, tapo) support it.

[nobody@masto.hackers.town]

@mwl I have a fairly recent eufy video camera that can do rtsp after I configured it in the app then blocked it from the internet. Kinda nice that they put supposedly random auth credentials on there. Still don't trust the thing

[makdaam@chaos.social]

@sebastian @mwl just make sure to block them explicitly from accessing the Internet. A lot of the cheap chinese cameras stream directly to Alibaba cloud from the moment they turn on, sometimes over HTTP (without S).

[sebastian@social.itu.dk]

@makdaam @mwl
yes, it is always a good idea to look at what packets the cam is trying to send (tcpdump, wireshark, ..)

[tallsimon@mstdn.ca]

@mwl Yes, but I bought it about 12 years ago.

[jaalsa@mastodon.bsd.cafe]

@mwl I do that with Dahua stuff

[brouhaha@mastodon.social]

@mwl
The search keyword is "RTSP".

[bjc@tines.spork.org]

@mwl flock cameras seem to be pretty wide open…

[mwl@io.mwl.io]

@brouhaha ty!

[auspiciousllama@pdx.social]

@viq @mwl I've been using Reolink cameras for several years, and while they do need the app to do initial configuration, you can enable RTMP, HTTP, HTTPS, and RTSP servers from the config. Be aware that they are cloud connected by default (and thus can be accessed externally), but that can be disabled.

[kurtm@bsd.network]

@mwl Antiques store?

[grumpybozo@toad.social]

@mwl I have an Amcrest which is entirely accessible via Safari. The HTML/JS/CSS is slow to load and provides a quirky UI, but it works.

I can also point VLC at the right port and watch the stream without authentication. That's why it sits behind a no-UPNP router.

[ams@infosec.exchange]

@mwl Anything onvif-compliant.

[drscriptt@oldbytes.space]

@mwl yes (mostly?) maybe?

Does video LAN client (VLC) count as an app in this case? It’s not vendor proprietary app.

I have some low end cameras off of Amazon in the last year that I can point VLC at and watch videos.

I may have needed the bender app to prime things. And I’m not even sure about that.
Let me know if you want to know more or have links.

[sebastian@social.itu.dk]

@makdaam @mwl
That said, I know of no evidence or reports that TP-Link cams should be trying to send anything to Alibaba (or other Chinese servers).