Thieves in our area are using Wi-Fi jammers to prevent security cameras from working. One of my neighbours has a Ring system that stopped working for the duration of a break-in.
Would a Wi-Fi jammer similarly render my eufyCam 2C useless?
My home base is wired, but I’m worried about the cameras themselves.
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According to the specs it is WiFi and that’s bound to some standards. I fear that it does get jammed.
Be careful and watchful, it’s WiFi so it is likely to be jammed.
I also want to know this, I warned Eufy already that this could possibly happen. That is why in their new Homebase project should include anti-jamming technology. For example, when jamming is detected, the alarm will go off https://www.google.nl/amp/s/ajax.systems/nl/blog/what-is-jamming/amp/
Did the Ring stopped working entirely? Or just for a small period of time? By the way jammers in my country are highly illegal and therefore also cost a lot, these people would then probably be professional burglars.
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My neighbour’s Ring system just stopped for a small period of time. Ring is particularly vulnerable because it has no local storage and records and uploads directly to the cloud.
For the Eufy system, I wondered whether there a small amount of storage onboard the camera that would allow it to work even if connectivity to the home base is down.
All of Eufy’s battery cams record to the homebase, so if they can’t communicate with it, they can’t record. Battery cams don’t have onboard storage. The wired cams and floodlights store on either SD card or MMC memory so would continue to record even though they couldn’t be viewed in the app. I have backed up my battery cams with a some wired cams that are set to record continously. This should protect me from anyone using a jammer, although I consider the threat to be pretty small.
@preset I know that the battery cameras communicate with their homebase (I’m assuming they use wifi, but not quite sure if they connect with another method). But I know they don’t need “internet” to record…as long as they have power. I had an internet outage in the past and all my wireless battery cameras recorded everything as planned. Of course, I did not receive alerts or was I able to see the live view, but as soon as I got internet back, the devices connected to the app and I was able to see all my footage (during our outage).
However, with that being said, internet and wifi jammers are two different things. I just wanted to throw it out there that the cameras don’t need “internet” to record…but I’m assuming they’ll still need a wifi connection.
I guess maybe a test to check a homebase that is hardwired with an ethernet cable, cut the wifi router (not the internet) and see if it records. 
You are correct that the cameras don’t need internet to record to the homebase. However, if your Homebase can’t communicate to the cameras becasue the wifi frequencies are being jammed, you won’t get any recordings. Eufy still uses the same frequency band as 2.4 Ghz Wifi for homebase to camera coms, they just use a slightly different protocol to save battery power.
I used a spectrum analyzer on my homebase signals and found that my homebase is using channel 11 of the wifi band to communicate with the cams. It also uses 915 Mhz to talk to sensors and keypads. I’m not sure if this wifi channel is the same for all homebases or if they choose a frequency band when the first device is added. It would make some sense for homebase to choose channels 1 or 11 as they are the least likely to get adjacent channel interference in the US.
Your test won’t really tell you anything as the homebase uses its own coms protocol to commincate to the cams and doesn’t depend on the router’s wifi radio. You can turn off the wifi radio on the router and the homebase will still talk to the cams and record events. Unfortunately, any jamming or other high frequency noise in the 2.4 Ghz band will blanket the homebase use of those frequencies and disable communications with the cams.
@preset I figured the wifi jammer would still be an issue, lol. Great detailed info though…thanks!
Assuming that you have both the camera’s and sensor, because of the sensors using the 915 MHz frequency a burglar has to have a multi frequency jammer (both 915 and 2.4). He also has to know which kind of security system you have AND get past your locks, yeah indeed a small chance.
Don’t use the Eufy window sticker, use a generic one.
If I simply turn off the homebase, I found that the 2C cameras just don’t record.
Is that a reasonable test of what would happen if the 2.4Ghz connection between the camera and base can’t be established - or am I missing something?
Side note- I’m not sure my eufy support agent understands what wifi jamming is… I’ll try going round the loop again.
…provide us the exact model No. of the wifi jamming and then we will try to find it and test it on our side. But if your Homebase is connected to the router via the ethernet cable, please no worry about it. Since the camera and the Homebase connection via their own 2.4G Wi-Fi will not be affected by the Wi-Fi jamming.
Perhaps send a link explaining what wifi jamming is? And how to protect against it, what for example their competitor does, the Ajax security system
Your test does duplicate what would happen when jamming takes place because the communication between homebase and cameras is broken. The battery cams like 2C don’t have any local storage, so if they can’t talk to the homebase, for any reason, the event can’t be saved.
I think the support person doesn’t really understand how the Eufy devices communicate. They are saying that if your homebase to router connection is done via ethernet, you won’t be subject to jamming. That’s not true. Any jamming on the 2.4 Ghz band will interfere with the camera to homebase connection unless its very narrow band. Your homebase can still talk to the internet via ethernet to the router, but can’t get through the blanket of noise put up by the jammers to talk to the cameras. If your router is connected to homebase via wifi, then you get a double whammy as the jammer will kill both sides of the homebase connection.
If you have discerning thieves, they can use a spectrum analyzer to find the frequencies that your security system is using and then just blanket a single channel. Most of them will just use a jammer that takes out the whole band.
Thanks!
I received a second response from eufy support - effectively sticking their head in the sand:
I understand your concern and please know that the camera and the Homebase are connected via the 2.4G HZ Wifi. But they communicate via their own protocol. So far we have not received a case of confirmed camera Wifi interference.
The 2C might prevent opportunists, but given security systems are supposed to provide piece of mind, the availability of jammers means that for me it makes the system not fit for purpose.
Eufy should fix this problem, that said most burglars are opportunistic and no security system is foolproof. If someone REALLY want to get into your house he/she will find a way.
To be truly protected you should diversify. You should also have good locks, alert neighbours, lighting etc.
I just did a test by putting a 2C cam next to my microwave. Its the only source of wideband noise I have avaiable. When I turned on the microwave, which is fairly recent model with good grounding, it reduced the video quality badly enough that it wouldn’t be usable for identification. It didn’t completely wipe out the video but it was badly pixelated. A jammer that concentrated the noise in the 2.4 Ghz band would probably knock out the entire feed.
It doesn’t matter what protocol you use in the 2.4 Ghz band, a large enough source of noise close to the devices will overcome the signal and error correction efforts and disable communications.
Only Lan cameras cannot be jammed. Better cameras use POE plus battery. If no battery then use a good ups. Some people use old lead acid battery UPS but use a car battery instead of the built in small battery. I don’t about resistance in that and possible overheating of wires. Thick battery cable required?
I have reported this to them. As I gave jammed my own cameras. I have email I can post from eufy trying to brush it off.
When the cameras are jammed with a de-auh spam through . They don’t respond to anything or record anything.
Eufy stuck there head in the sand, and said you need to kn ow the ssid, mac and wifi band. Using various utilities on Kali this is easy. Even for a amateur.
The TL;DR the eufy 2c can be taken offline by being spammed.