Disassembled surveillance camera with visible wires on a white background.

Concealing a surveillance camera can be trickier than you might think. If you want to keep your camera out of sight and avoid rousing any suspicion, you'll need to know a few tricks and the main mistakes to avoid. The worst places to hide a camera Whatever you do, don't fall foul of these rookie camera-hiding mistakes:

  • Behind a peculiarly placed mirror. If the person or people in question have any sense (or have experience with hidden cameras), they're bound to be suspicious of a mirror with no business being there—for example, a mirror at the wrong height or in a room with many mirrors.
  • Nestled in a rearranged cluster of objects. If you've moved things around, it may be obvious due to the dust you've disturbed. Some groupings can also look unnatural or as if they are trying to hide something.
  • Right at eye level or where the lens may catch the light. The rest of the camera is easy to hide, but the sparkly, light-reflecting lens can give the game away if you aren't careful. Position your camera above eye level, angling it carefully to get the best view, and test out different natural and artificial lights to ensure the lens doesn't catch the light.
  • Where the 'on' light is exposed, it sounds like an obvious tip to remember to cover up the LED 'on' the light if your camera has one, but so many people forget. All someone has to do is switch the lights off and look for this little light, and your carefully hidden camera will be discovered.

Now for the best

Here is a best practice guide to the art of clever camera concealing try these places:

  • In a ceiling fitting. Unless you dangle it from the ceiling without any disguise, it's unlikely that anyone will spot a camera if you hide it in a light fitting or smoke alarm spy camera on the ceiling. Few of us spend much time looking at the ceiling, and we certainly don't look twice at things we expect to be there, like lights and smoke alarm boxes.
  • In an innocuous, everyday household item. Like items on the ceiling, most people aren't suspicious of items they expect to see in a particular room. For example, bedroom radio alarm clocks, a kitchen coffee machine, a wall clock, and living room lamps exist. These are where you should hide your spy camera, or even better, buy a camera designed to fit inside this kind of disguise. Just make sure you don't choose something likely to be used when it doesn't have full functionality, as this will arouse suspicion.
  • In or behind something boring. No one looks twice at plug adaptors or phone chargers simply because they are so functional and remarkable and we are used to seeing them all the time.