There are a huge number of Google hacks out there (just Google that term, of course, to find examples). Combine that with the huge number of devices out there that have IP addresses (e.g. printers, network drives, IP cameras, etc.) and there are some interesting things you can do, like Googling “inurl” scripting/search functions. Read more…
There are a huge number of Google hacks out there (just Google that term, of course, to find examples). Combine that with the huge number of devices out there that have IP addresses (e.g. printers, network drives, IP cameras, etc.) and there are some interesting things you can do, like Googling “inurl” scripting/search functions.
I have no interest in true hacking (i.e. rummaging through people’s private junk) although viewing random unprotected IP cameras around the world in public places and controlling their panning and zoom functions is kind of mind-blowing. There are a ton of fun GHacks out there – like spelling out words in pictures using Google image search, and the Google poetry generator, or the news map generator etc. Check out more than a dozen Google Hacks here.
Also worth a look is this story on IP cameras and how you can find them on Google:
For example, the command “inurl:view/index.shtml” will look for the string “view/index.shtml” in all URLs. This happens to be a string that one of the camera manufacturers uses in its systems. Google finds almost a thousand URLs with this string – almost all of them are Axis IP-based cameras. Other strings to look for include “ViewerFrame?Mode=” and “MultiCameraFrame?Mode=.” Together they produce more than 2,000 additional hits.
I did a random look at the URLs the searches came up with and looked at a snowstorm in Lapland, Finland; an empty auditorium in Mexico; the center of East Ayrshire, England; the interiors of a number of restaurants and stores; a construction site in Hungary; ice and snow on Lake Lucille, Ala.; a bunch of car garages; furniture showrooms; a number of computer centers; a Japanese radio talk show; lots of parking lots; and scads of traffic and weather cams. Some of the cameras could even be controlled over the Web. By the way, there seems to be a lot of snow in Japan right now.
Another good resource is Google Hacks
There are also some malicious Google hacks that point out the vulnerability of our data vs. the power of Google.
What are your favorite Google Hacks?