‘I’m in your baby’s room’: Texas parents say hacker took over Nest baby monitor to issue terrifying threats
- Ellen and Nathan Rigney said a stranger threatened to kidnap their infant son, talking through their Wi-fi baby monitor and hijacking the system’s camera
At first, it was a beeping that woke Ellen and Nathan Rigney in the middle of the night. Then it became something more sinister.
A stranger’s voice, spouting “sexual expletives,” wafted through a baby monitor in the Texas couple’s room – one that was linked to a Nest camera in their infant’s room upstairs, according to KPRC News.
Alarmed, the Rigneys turned on their lights. Unprompted, a Nest camera in their room activated and the same man’s voice told them to turn the lights back off.
“I’m going to kidnap your baby,” the voice said next, Ellen Rigney recalled to the news station. “I’m in your baby’s room.”
Spying on baby: Hackers can easily access video crib monitors, report finds
Nathan Rigney bolted upstairs to his son’s crib. But the four-month-old was fast asleep, oblivious to the unsettling incident that had just transpired and spooked his parents. There was no one else in his room.