Featured Image Credit: TikTok/Kurinadele
Topics: News, Parenting, Technology
Amelia Jones
A mum has taken to TikTok to warn other parents about the risks of using WiFi cameras and how it was her son who blew the whistle, telling his mum 'someone talks to him at night’.
Kurin Adele has 336.4K followers on the social platform but went viral after she claimed that someone hacked into her child’s Owlet baby monitor - and her son was terrified.
The self-professed 'crunchy mum friend' uploaded the video six days ago and it's since received 6.5m views at the time of writing.
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She explains that the incident started when she was putting her son to bed after a wet accident and noticed the camera was no longer plugged in.
When she went to turn it back on, her son begged her not to saying: "‘I don’t want my camera plugged in, I don’t want my camera plugged in, someone talks to me at night and it scares me. Someone wakes me up and talks to me and I’m scared, I don’t want my camera plugged in,'” she recalls.
The reason he hadn't mentioned it sooner? The person on the other side of the Owlet camera was claiming to be his parents, a move which left the child 'completely terrified'.
When the TikToker and her husband went to change the password for their two cameras, a notification popped up explaining that there had been a data leak - a notice they'd never seen before.
The realisation washed over her that her camera system, and therefore her son, had been left exposed.
She asks, terrified: “Who the heck knows how long someone has had our password and has been messing with my son?”
She reassures her followers that she would be replacing her Owlet model with a non WiFi camera, the Infant Optics, that same day.
Followers were quick to comment and share similar experiences.
One shared: “This same thing happened with our Owlet camera. I was walking past my sons room and I heard someone telling him to ‘calm down buddy.. it’s ok.'”
Another exclaimed: “This happened to us! My son would cry about monsters! Needless to say both of ours went in the trash."
Perhaps most spine-chilling of all, a third said: “One night we heard loud growling. I thought it was cats fighting outside, but it was someone on my 2 year-old’s camera. Horrifying!”
The influencer, after facing criticism for doing a partnership with a product she claims not to like, has since done an update on the hacking scandal claiming that Owlet had been 'dismissive'.
She said they told her that their data is 'super encrypted' and that 'there's no way that anyone ever could hack in' but assured her they'd 'look into it further' and find out 'who logged into their account and when'.
However, the TikTok star says she is 'bummed' that this level of customer service is due to her having a large platform.
Tyla has reached out to Owlet for comment.