Instagram shows me too many videos of "pick up artists" doing POV videos of their douchey interaction with girls, recorded on these. I wonder if it's too stealthy that the people being recorded don't notice. Slash, maybe they have release forms and the videos published are just the ones where they consented to being recorded (heh, as if the pick-up scene cares so great about consent...), and the failed ones are where they immediately say "Is that a camera? Fuck off!".
If you put black tape over the light, it will not allow you to turn on the camera, however, I believe someone found a hack that said if you started recording and then put black tape over the recording, it would allow you to continue to record, but only for 3 minute increments.
I suppose that really depends on how hard they’re trying to prevent you from doing that…
* They could measure the forward voltage of the LED when driven by a known current. Bonus points for measuring at multiple currents. Remember that the forward voltage depends on color.
* They could measure the reverse leakage current at a known voltage, and compare that to the illumination from the camera’s exposure feedback. Remember that every LED is also a photodiode.
* They could vary the LED driver current to heat it up, then measure that both of the above measurements are compatible with the higher temperature. Remember that most semiconductor properties have a strong temperature dependence.
So it would be pretty easy to detect most simple mods if they really wanted to.
It does have a glowing LED: https://youtu.be/X95mWoTgjaE?t=105 but I feel like they're easy to hide with some black tape.