Security Camera 2.0 – Mac App Review
Security Camera is a great Mac app and that certainly bears fruit in its sales, where it has reached the top spots in the Mac App Store Utilities category in many countries around the world. Not least reaching number 2 in both the US and UK App Store charts.
We’re really impressed with this app, read our review below to find out why this app should be on your Mac.
You’ve probably heard the story a while back now on the intertubes about how one guy, after sending his Apple MacBook Pro off for repair, saw still pictures of the repairman (should we say ‘repairperson’ now to be PC) working away fixing his laptop. Somehow, the built-in iSight camera had triggered periodically during the process. Now the guy whose MBP it was didn’t own up to installing any software, and maybe there wasn’t anything commercially available at the time, but I’m willing to wager those stills sent shivers down the spines of people all over the globe, and for as many different reasons.
The idea that the innocuous little built-in camera could be recording you in front of your computer completely unaware is unnerving to say the least, and up and till then it was the kind of make believe you might find in a Tom Clancy novel (hey, no disrespect intended) or the stuff of Hollywood movies.
Costing a cent under five bucks from the Mac App Store, Security Camera will give you the same capability, heck , the story may have even inspired the app. It’s simple no-nonsense kind of utility but it’s very effective. You can see that from the preferences above.
So that it’s running in the background all the time simply check the Start Security Camera at login, then it will take a furtive snap 30-seconds after your Mac has been woken from sleep. And you can alter that using the slider at the bottom of the window. Although there’s no further option to time delay, the app continues to take snaps every 5-6 minutes thereafter, providing the Mac is in use.
Although there’s an option to protect the app with a password, with the idea being to prevent unauthorized users deleting the images from the menu available from the icon in the menu bar, if you know your way around Mac you can find them on the HD and delete them anyway (they’re squirreled away under Users/LibraryApplication Support/SecurityCamera). But here’s the thing, version 2.0 adds a neat option to sync those shots with Drop box. That’s clever especially if you’ve installed the app on your laptop and some unspeakable person has just stolen it (okay both you and they’ve got to have internet access too for it to be truly useful). But that is neat, although bear in mind in this instance the Drop box folder is really just an alias to the images on the laptop’s HD, so it’s still vulnerable from deletion.
Apart from spying on unauthorized users you may think there’s not much more to the app than that, but the developers have come up with quite a few more suggestions, we won’t reiterate those here but we think they’ve got some valid points. For a modest sum this app is easy to recommend but it’s an absolute must if you’re concerned that someone might be trying to gain access to your computer that really shouldn’t be anywhere near it.
This app comes highly recommend from theappwhisperer.com – you can download it here for $4.99.
Joanne Carter
Joanne Carter, creator of the world’s most popular mobile photography and art website— TheAppWhisperer.com— TheAppWhisperer platform has been a pivotal cyberspace for mobile artists of all abilities to learn about, to explore, to celebrate and to share mobile artworks. Joanne’s compassion, inclusivity, and humility are hallmarks in all that she does, and is particularly evident in the platform she has built. In her words, “We all have the potential to remove ourselves from the centre of any circle and to expand a sphere of compassion outward; to include everyone interested in mobile art, ensuring every artist is within reach”, she has said. Promotion of mobile artists and the art form as a primary medium in today’s art world, has become her life’s focus. She has presented lectures bolstering mobile artists and their art from as far away as the Museum of Art in Seoul, South Korea to closer to her home in the UK at Focus on Imaging. Her experience as a jurist for mobile art competitions includes: Portugal, Canada, US, S Korea, UK and Italy. And her travels pioneering the breadth of mobile art includes key events in: Frankfurt, Naples, Amalfi Coast, Paris, Brazil, London. Pioneering the world’s first mobile art online gallery - TheAppWhispererPrintSales.com has extended her reach even further, shipping from London, UK to clients in the US, Europe and The Far East to a global group of collectors looking for exclusive art to hang in their homes and offices. The online gallery specialises in prints for discerning collectors of unique, previously unseen signed limited edition art. Her journey towards becoming The App Whisperer, includes (but is not limited to) working for a paparazzi photo agency for several years and as a deputy editor for a photo print magazine. Her own freelance photographic journalistic work is also widely acclaimed. She has been published extensively both within the UK and the US in national and international titles. These include The Times, The Sunday Times, The Guardian, Popular Photography & Imaging, dpreview, NikonPro, Which? and more recently with the BBC as a Contributor, Columnist at Vogue Italia and Contributing Editor at LensCulture. Her professional photography has also been widely exhibited throughout Europe, including Italy, Portugal and the UK. She is currently writing several books, all related to mobile art and is always open to requests for new commissions for either writing or photography projects or a combination of both. Please contact her at: [email protected]
