November 2015 - GlassWire Blog

These days not only can software installed on your PC easily access your webcam or mic, but now most browsers can too! Chrome, Firefox, and other modern browsers now have built in access to your webcam and mic with WebRTC.

If you don’t want WebRTC to work in your browsers at all you can turn it off completely but some people need to use their webcam or mic with Firefox for online meetings or other online activities. It’s no fun to completely disable your webcam or mic.

We at GlassWire also felt nervous not knowing when our PCs were using our webcam or microphones, so we built in an extra security feature with GlassWire Basic, Pro, and Elite. After upgrading your version of GlassWire to one of our paid versions go to your settings, then click “security” and turn on the “Camera and mic monitor”. Once the camera and mic monitor is activated you should be alerted when any network-related application accesses your microphone.

If an unknown network-related application is accessing your webcam or mic go to the GlassWire “Alerts” tab and click its icon to learn more about the program and its location on your PC. You can also scan the app by clicking the “virus scan” button. If you’re still not sure about the unknown app try uploading it to VirusTotal.com and see if it shows more information.

Check out the screenshot at the top of this email to see how our webcam and microphone notifications work. After you upgrade to GlassWire’s paid version be sure and go to your settings then click the “security” section to enable this feature.

Update 12/3/2015: We just learned the latest Windows 10 update issued last week disabled this functionality for some users. Be sure and download our latest version of GlassWire if Mic/Webcam detection is not working for you. If the detection still is not working after upgrading to the latest version go to the GlassWire settings and make sure the Mic/Webcam detection is turned on.

Download GlassWire Today

Updated: This feature had to be removed due to changes to Windows unfortunately. There is no reliable way to detect Mic/Webcam usage anymore due to changes outside our control.

Monitoring remotely with GlassWire

Did you know GlassWire can monitor remote servers, along with other local PCs in your house all in one place? If you want to see what’s going on with the network activity of your server at work, your game server, or the other PCs in your house it’s easy to find out with GlassWire. Please note remote monitoring is off by default and can only be turned on with your administrator password.

Remoting Out – To remote out and connect to another computer or server go to the “Client” tab in the settings. The settings can be accessed by going to the top left “GlassWire” menu and choosing “Settings”. Next click “Remote Server” then put in the Name (you can name it whatever you want), the computer IP address or host name, and password that you set up with GlassWire. Once you are connected the remote server’s network activity will appear via the GlassWire graph window and you can monitor your server or computer remotely.

Allowing Remote Monitoring – To allow someone to remotely monitor your computer or server you must go to the GlassWire settings then choose the “Server” tab. Next, click the “Remote Access” option and click “Unlock” and type in your operating system password to turn on this feature. You can then choose to allow remote access to the server and put in a password. For extra security we recommend you only allow access from your IP address if it’s a static one that doesn’t change often.

Check the screenshot above of GlassWire in remote monitor mode. In this example GlassWire is monitoring the Local PC its installed on under “Local” then its monitoring three other PCs or servers. GlassWire’s free version can monitor one server but you can upgrade to Basic, Pro, or Elite to monitor more.

Download GlassWire