Two days after an eye-popping privacy breach in which users of Anker’s Eufy security cameras were suddenly able to see video streams from other Eufy users’ cameras while using the Eufy app, Anker’s smart home brand has issued a second apology while detailing how it will prevent a breach “from ever happening again.”
In a statement Eufy released on Facebook and Twitter, the brand insisted that only a “limited number” of users in seven countries were able to see each others’ EufyCam video streams.
A total of 712 users in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Cuba, New Zealand, Australia, and Argentina were affected by the bug, Eufy said.
“We understand that we need to build trust again with you,” the statement reads. “We are incredibly sorry and promise to take all the necessary measures to prevent this from ever happening again.”
Among those measures is “upgrading our network architecture and strengthening our two-way authentication mechanisms between the servers, devices, and the Eufy Security app,” along with “upgrading our servers to improve their processing capacity in order to eliminate potential risks,” the statement continues.
Eufy didn’t detail what caused the breach, which struck at about 4:50 a.m. ET on Monday, although it said that its engineers “identified the issue” an hour later and “immediately rolled back the server version and deployed an emergency update.”
The problem was fixed by 6:30 a.m. ET the same morning, Eufy said, but not before some users were able to see videos of strangers in the Eufy app. One user on the EufyCam subreddit described being able to see another user’s live feed and even control their camera, while a user on Facebook claimed they could see a stranger’s baby sleeping (the company sells video baby monitors in addition to doorbell cameras and indoor and outdoor security cameras).
While it’s good that Eufy issued a second mea culpa for the hair-raising privacy breach, the brand has its work cut out for it in terms of regaining the trust of its understandably shaken users, not to mention attracting new buyers to the brand.