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  • How to Use Phillips Hue Lights Privately/Securely?

c86 I have a router that allows setting any specific LAN port to any guest network I set up.

That's awesome. Would you mind sharing what router it is? Is it a feature it had out of the box or did you have to flash it with e.g. OpenWRT?

@DeletedUser84 As for controling the bulbs, I have managed to find 3 FOSS solutions:

  1. Home Assistant (website, github, F-Droid).
  2. OpenHAB (website, github, F-Droid)
  3. Home App (website, github, F-Droid).

It seems that 1 and 2 require setting up a server. 3 is capable of communicating with Philips Hue bridge. Sadly it doesn't seem to be actively maintained.

      IcyScroll

      The bigger ASUS, Firewalla, and Netgear routers have it in settings. OpenWRT may make it work on units, you would have to check within their guide

        c86 thanks for your response!

        Unfortunately I've got to keep them because I use them for content and I bought them before I knew about online privacy/security. It's the one of the only IoT devices I have setup.

        But so far it seems as though the its not as a big of a problem that I made it out to be. Again, appreciate the response :)

        • c86 replied to this.

            DeletedUser84

            No worries at all, glad it may have helped. Given what you recently said I'd suggest looking into threat modeling. It's specific per person and can help you decide what you want to keep private along with who you're wanting to avoid.

            My take away from your post is its general privacy and maybe surveillance capitalism - big tech and all the unknown ad companies following us around the internet.

            Anyway, once you decide your threat model, its easy to use isolated accounts or burner accounts (even if its google) for what you want to accomplish. You just have to taken some extra steps to keep private sometimes.

            The worst you can do is think you have to avoid everything (like Google) because it's used by some agency to monitor you, or be concerned about being hit with Pegasus etc. Yes some people need that level of privacy, like whistleblowers, journalists or lawyers to name a few. But that's not what everyone needs. You don't want to get overwhelmed.

            Cheers

                c86 Yeah, my threat model is mostly against surveillance capitalism, and general privacy concerns.

                Thank you heaps for the suggestions, you seem like a really kind and caring person. Have a blessed day and Merry Christmas.

                  I use phillips hue since years. I don't allow internet access to the bridge, so it's essentially offline. Never use the original app, as it forces an account now. I use the app "Hue Essentials" to control them at home if the normal smart switches aren't enough. Using a vpn, I can even control the lights when not at home. I also made a small go app to control the lights when I'm to lazy to get off my pc and don't have my phone at hand.

                  So yea, phillips should not know anything about my bridge and home now, except I missed something

                    spl4tt how do you block internet access to the Bridge? Via your router settings? Nice setup btw.

                        spl4tt sorry to bug you with another question, but on my router settings, I can't see the Phillips Hue Bridge as a connected device. Does it have a name, or just some random letters? (there is one with random letters for me)

                            DeletedUser84 i can see the IP address of the bridge in the Hue essentials app. That's the one I used. In the device list of the connected devices, you can see its unique identifier only, which makes it hard to find

                                DeletedUser87 Actually, this should automatically happen if you use something like parental control for this. But you're right, once the ip changes, the wrong device would be blocked. I guess it depends on your router quality