GENEVA (AP) – Swiss authorities on Monday confirmed a police raid on the home of a Swiss software engineer who was called in to help break into the online networks of a US security camera company, a party of what the hacker activist cited as an effort to raise awareness about the dangers of mass surveillance.
The Federal Office of Justice said central police in central Lucerne, acting on a request for legal assistance from U.S. authorities, conducted a search of homes involving hacker Tillie Kottmann on Friday.
The hacker said online that electronic devices were confiscated during the raid. The Swiss office declined to specify the location or comment, postponing all questions to “the appropriate US authority.”
The FBI said Friday in a statement that it was “aware of the police activity that took place in Switzerland,” but made no further comment.
Kottmann had identified himself as a member of a group of “hacktivists” who say they were able to view live channels and watch hospitals, schools, factories, prisons and corporate offices for much of Monday and Tuesday of the week. passed after accessing the systems. of the California start-up Verkada. They said the action was aimed at raising awareness about mass surveillance.
Verkada later blocked them by disabling all internal administrator accounts that hackers had accessed using valid credentials found online. The company alerted law enforcement and its customers.
Kottmann, who uses pronouns, told social media site Mastodon last week that the raid was not specifically about the Verkada hack, but was linked to a previous FBI investigation. Earlier, Kottmann drew attention to leaking pirated material to expose security flaws, including U.S. chip maker Intel last year.
It is common for professional cybersecurity researchers to investigate online systems for security flaws, although “hacktivists” often go a step further by publicly exposing security risks or filtering materials to produce social change.
Kottmann did not immediately return requests for comment.
Verkada, based in San Mateo, California, has introduced its cloud-based surveillance service as part of the next generation of workplace security. Its software detects when people are in sight of the camera and the “People History” feature allows customers to recognize and track individual faces and other attributes, such as clothing color and likely gender. Not all customers use the facial recognition feature.
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O’Brien reported from Providence, Rhode Island.