If that weren't reason enough to choose a secure camera, unencrypted transmissions could also leak your Wi Fi password or router credentials, giving an attacker complete control over your home network. An attacker could even draft your camera into a botnet, such as in the recent Mirai DDoS attacks, or spy on your social media interactions, financial dealings and private correspondences. Owning an IP camera may not be a terrible idea; AV TEST points out that burglaries in its native Germany have increased by 10 percent since last year. If you do, however, try to buy from a reputable manufacturer, and keep the firmware up to date all the time. If not, you may be trading one kind of insecurity for another. We've reached out to D Link and to Hanhwa Techwin for comment, and will update this story with replies.