The Wyze Cam Vase hides a security camera in plain sight
With its latest security camera accessory, Wyze is aiming to tidy up your home decor while making it easier to spy on the happenings in a room. Yes, it’s a little creepy.
The $20 Wyze Cam Vase is basically just a short, rectangular vase with a circular cutout on the side that’s designed to fit the lens of the Wyze Cam v3, the Cam v4, or the Cam v3 Pro. The camera itself isn’t included, but Wyze is selling a bundle with the vase and a Wyze Cam v4 for $50.
Basically, you slide your Wyze cam into the cement-composite vase (tektite and speckled finishes are available), with the lens peeking out from the circular cutout, and then place the included faux grass (or the fake foliage of your choice) on top; Wyze discourages using real plants, lest they hinder airflow or drip water onto the camera. The vase sits on four silicone feet, while a hole in the bottom lets you discreetly run the power cable.
You then place the Wyze Cam Vase in a strategic spot in your kitchen, dining room, den, or other household space, and…well, keep an eye on things? Monitor the area? Or just flat-out spy on folks?
Clever or creepy?Wyze
For its part, Wyze describes the new Wyze Cam Vase as “discreet,” “sleek,” and “gorgeous,” allowing users to place a Wyze Cam in their home without “having the camera stick out like a sore thumb.”
Wyze also notes that the vase’s “open design and ceramic material” won’t interfere with the camera’s Wi-Fi connectivity, while the lens opening will “ensure zero visual obstruction and crystal-clear footage.”
To be fair, the Wyze Cam Vase can’t hide a Wyze camera completely, because the opening for the lens is a big giveaway. Wyze cams also have a status light that glows—or can glow—when the camera is active. (The light can be deactivated.)
Still, there’s an undeniable “ick” factor to the Wyze Cam Vase, and while those intent on hiding a security camera will do so with or without the new accessory, the vase could certainly encourage their spycam ambitions.
This story is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best security cameras. 
© 2025 PC World 3:25am  
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Windows XP returns! Re-experience the magic for free in your browser
Launched in 2001, Windows XP is still considered by many to be one of the best things Microsoft ever made, and it was a real loss when it was officially discontinued in 2014. Now, one project by Reddit user ducbao414 (spotted by Windows Central) lets you relive the glory of Windows XP directly in a web browser.
It was released back on July 13th in celebration of 25 years since Windows XP first began development, with the goal of allowing others to enjoy the nostalgic XP moments of their childhoods.
To be clear, the project is not a full-blown running of Windows XP. Instead, it’s more of a web-based replica that merely recreates the classic XP interface. You can’t browse via Internet Explorer nor can you run any external apps, but you can run the included apps (e.g., Paint, Media Player Classic, Microsoft Word, Minesweeper).
Try it out yourself! It’s freely available at win32.run. Whether you miss the golden days of Windows XP or never got to experience it yourself, it’s a fun way to kill some time.
© 2025 PC World 3:05am 
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Your body can be fingerprinted and tracked using Wi-Fi signals
As if you didn’t have enough to worry about when it comes to surveillance, researchers have discovered a new way to identify and track people using Wi-Fi signals—and I’m not talking about anything relating to your electronic devices. This tech can identify a specific, individual person, and track them in a physical space and across locations, based on how their body interacts with Wi-Fi signals.
“WhoFi,” a system developed by researchers at La Sapienza University of Rome, makes me think of that one “sonar” scene from The Dark Knight. And to be sure, tracking the way wireless electronic signals interact with the physical world isn’t anything new—almost a decade ago they figured out how to make a 3D map of a building using Wi-Fi. But this new system can “fingerprint” individual people (or at least their bodies), track them in physical space, and re-identify them in the same or a different location, based on the way Wi-Fi signals bounce off and through them.
Similar attempts have been made as recently as 2020, but only achieved a 75 percent accuracy, which wasn’t good enough for true surveillance. According to the research paper (spotted by The Register), the WhoFi system can be up to 95.5 percent accurate when used with its neural network. This setup could beat conventional identification with cameras in many ways, as it isn’t affected by light conditions and can “see” through walls and other physical objects.
The implications are staggering, given the ubiquity of Wi-Fi in nearly every public and private space. A fairly innocuous but still creepy use might be a system that determines when a specific customer returns to a store and texts them a coupon as a “welcome back” present. A far more sinister application would be simply tracking where a person goes and when, including private residences, if the Wi-Fi data were sold or otherwise obtained. It goes without saying that government agencies would be extremely interested in getting access to that data.
At present, the WhoFi system is a proof of concept requiring some incredibly advanced software to implement. But it’s very real, and the hardware used to develop it wasn’t anything special. According to the dataset in the paper, these results were achieved using the Wi-Fi signals generated by two TP-Link N750 routers, which are pretty basic models that aren’t even using the latest, fastest Wi-Fi tech.
The only cold comfort I can offer to someone who finds the implications creepy is that the testing setup isn’t exactly forensic. Again, referring to the dataset, the researchers used 14 different people to track, with each one wearing a combination of base clothing, outerwear, and a backpack. Achieving 95 percent accuracy over that relatively small sample probably wouldn’t be enough to, say, present as evidence in a criminal trial… but it’s certainly good enough to track someone down for an arrest.
© 2025 PC World 3:25am 
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