Checking into a hotel room this Valentine’s Day? Ensure you’re not being watched by peeping Toms

For all intents and purposes, India, unfortunately, is a country that isn’t aware of the concept of privacy, especially between romantic couples. Even when married, couples often find it difficult to find time and more importantly, space, where they can be just themselves, without a care in the world, and let their inhibitions loose. The lack of space and privacy becomes even more apparent when lovebirds live with their families, or in hostels.  

As a result, many couples have to check in at some hotel or the other to share an intimate moment, especially around Valentine’s Day. Unfortunately for them, thanks to the boom of the Internet in India and the insatiable lasciviousness of people on the internet, walls nowadays don’t only have ears, they have some pretty high-definition eyes as well.

There is a serious concern that the private and sometimes, wild moments that couples share with their partners in hotels and resorts., may end up on the internet as smut if they are not careful. This happens way more often during the most major holiday season and during Valentine’s Day.

And we’re not just talking about some dingy hotel rooms here - even well-established hotel chains have had instances where managers were caught bugging their guest’s rooms with cameras to record them going bonkers on one other. After all, cheap, wireless cameras that transmit footage, and are extremely easy to hide, have only become more common and easy to procure.  

So if you’re planning to check in to a hotel this Valentine’s Day, here are a few tech tips and tricks that will help you find out if your room is bugged and locate any hidden cameras in the room.

Use your phone to find an IR-equipped camera

One of the things that makes it much easier to locate these bugs and hidden cameras, is the fact that they use infrared or IR to light things up, when you turn down the lights.  

In order to capture movement or take pictures in dimly lit or dark spaces, cameras typically use infrared light, which is invisible to human sight. The sensor on your smartphone camera, however, should be able to perceive the IR light generated by the hidden camera even if you are unable to. In certain phones, only the front-facing camera can capture IR light but in a vast majority of them, both, the front as well as the rear cameras can do that.  

To check if your phone is capable of picking up IR light, simply point a remote to one of the cameras on your smartphone, and press a button on the while recording a video on your smartphone. If you see the remote lighting up, that means your camera can pick up IR light. Next, when you check in to your room, simply turn off the lights after a few minutes, and shoot a video of the room focusing on objects such as the TV, the clocks, electrical fixtures, etc. - these are the places where the hotel staff mostly hide these cameras.  

Scan the network in your room for unknown and strange networks 

If the IR method doesn’t work (either because there isn’t a camera in the room or the camera isn’t equipped with IR), then another way you might be able to discover an active device is to see what else is linked to the local network.

There are several network analyzer applications available that may help you discover what devices are linked to your local network. These tools can locate and catalogue any device connected to your network. They also allow you to validate which devices you recognise, making it easier to spot any unauthorised devices.

You should be looking for networks or rather devices that have random alphanumeric codes or special symbols as their name - cheap wireless cameras that are placed by the hotel staff usually have these kinds of names.  

Of course, neither of these methods is infallible, they are only options for you to explore. Your best bet is to go to a trusted friend’s house who lives by themselves and has room to spare, or, check into a proper, posh hotel that cannot risk getting caught in such a scandal.  

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