Camfecting is most often carried out by infecting the victim's computer with a virus that can provide the hacker access to their webcam.
This attack is specifically targeted at the victim's webcam, and hence the name camfecting, a portmanteau of the words camera and infecting.
[2] In November 2013, American teenager Jared James Abrahams pleaded guilty to hacking over 100-150 women and installing the highly invasive malware Blackshades on their computers in order to obtain nude images and videos of them.
[3] Researchers from Johns Hopkins University have shown how to covertly capture images from the iSight camera on MacBook and iMac models released before 2008, by reprogramming the microcontroller's firmware.
There is now a market for the manufacture and sale sliding lens covers that allow users to physically block their computer's camera and, in some cases, microphone.