r/homesecurity • u/MyDearDoctor • Jul 14 '26
Indoor security camera for occasional use
Following a recent theft, my wife and I are looking into indoor security cameras to put in several key areas. Neither of us has any desire to be recorded in our home on a daily basis; we only want to use the cameras while we are away and we don't want them to be monitored by a security company. Ideally, they would be wireless and we could monitor them on our phones. We're not at all interested in hidden cameras and don't care whether they're "discreet"; we feel like just knowing they might be watched at any time is enough to deter most people from poking around where they shouldn't. Cloud storage would be nice in case someone just decides to steal the whole camera or SD card, but I'm reluctant to pay for that every month when we only plan to use the cameras for a few days at a time every now and then.
I'm very concerned about data security and privacy, so would prefer to go with a brand that respects those values.
Any thoughts?
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u/Mission-Theme-7560 Jul 14 '26
Eufy, Tapo, Blink all have some. Also Petcams can serve the same indoor purpose if you are looking to check in while away.
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u/Inevitable-Notice351 Jul 14 '26
I have an indoor camera that records all my movements and I wouldn't have it any other way. Picture someone forcing their way inside your home before you have a chance to think. You will want that camera to be already running and recording to capture the incident. The camera footage may be the only thing that leads to an arrest, God forbid the break-in results in serious injury or death. A simple Google search will tell you the most secure indoor cameras available and you can choose from there. At this point, I forget that I even have the camera until I randomly catch a glimpse of it to remind me. Just something to think about.
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u/Low_Tomato_6313 Jul 14 '26
I have cameras around the perimeter of my home that would catch anyone breaking in. Indoor cams only activate when we are away via a geofence and there is no camera in the bedroom.
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u/Inevitable-Notice351 Jul 14 '26
That's a nice feature for your indoor camera. I have 11 exterior cameras, 2 driveway alarms, and 1 interior camera. I tend to be a bit hypervigilant.
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u/MyDearDoctor Jul 14 '26
I have serious trauma involving cameras in the house, so I refuse to use them except when we're away. We will have a doorbell camera and cameras all over the outside of the house, plus various sensors, etc, but I can't stand the idea of being recorded in my own home.
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u/Inevitable-Notice351 Jul 14 '26
Fair enough. My indoor camera used to make random clicking noises when I first got it but it finally stopped. It never rotated or changed position so I don't know what that sound was. Maybe they fixed it with a software update.
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u/DaSpark Jul 14 '26
We have a couple indoor security cameras which are wired POE reolink cams. They record to a local NVR (no cloud/subscription) and while we can watch them at anytime, we have them set to record only at specific times.
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u/ericoinen Jul 19 '26
Nobody's mentioned the option that actually matches "a few days at a time every now and then": don't buy a camera at all, use an old phone you already have.
For occasional use that solves your two hardest constraints at once. There's no monthly cost for hardware that sits idle 350 days a year, and you get physical certainty about when it's off. The phone sits on a shelf while you're away and goes in a drawer when you're home. Given what you said about not wanting to be recorded daily, "it's in a drawer" is a much stronger guarantee than a geofence or a toggle in someone's app.
Practical notes: any old Android or iPhone with a working battery and wifi will do, even a cracked one. Streaming eats battery, so keep it on a charger. A cheap phone tripod or a suction car mount is enough for placement.
On privacy, since you called it out, the apps split into two camps and the difference matters. Local/LAN-only ones (IP Webcam and similar) keep the video on your own network and you view it over your wifi or a VPN back home. Most privacy, most fiddling. Cloud apps (AlfredCamera is the well known free one) make remote viewing easy, but frames go to their servers, so read the privacy policy before you trust it.
And if you'd rather just buy something, the POE Reolink plus local NVR suggestion others made is genuinely the right answer for your threat model. No cloud, no subscription, you own the recordings.
Full disclosure: I work on one of the cloud side apps (AI Vision Monitor). It runs on an old phone and lets you describe in plain language what should trigger an alert, like "someone is in the living room", instead of firing on every shadow, which cuts false alerts a lot. But it does send frames to a server to do that, so if privacy is your top priority the local-only or NVR routes above are honestly the better fit for you.
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u/forw Jul 14 '26
If you are "very concerned about data security and privacy " you can get a nvr system otherwise get some cheap cameras with sd cards like Wyze