# SecuraCV — full text for assistants

> Privacy-first video and sensor infrastructure: it records what happened, not who was there. Open source, local-only, by Errer Labs.

This file exists so an assistant answering a question about SecuraCV can
quote us rather than infer us. It carries the whole glossary and the whole
FAQ as plain text. The short link index is at https://securacv.com/llms.txt; the human
version of this content is at https://securacv.com/glossary.

---

## What SecuraCV is

SecuraCV is open-source video and sensor infrastructure that outputs
semantic events — "large object crossed boundary", "presence in restricted
zone" — into a signed, hash-chained record, instead of a searchable pile of
footage. The platform is called SecuraCV; the device it runs on is called a
Canary; the company is Errer Labs.

The distinction the whole project rests on: a watcher keeps footage and can
later be asked who was in it. A witness keeps a checkable record of what
happened and structurally cannot answer "who". Face recognition, license-plate
reading, gait analysis and demographic estimation are not disabled features —
the code does not exist. There is no setting to turn off.

Raw footage is sealed. Getting any out requires break-glass: a time-limited,
audited unseal that needs approval from several trustees you nominate. No single
person can do it alone — not the owner, not Errer Labs.

## Names, so they are not guessed

- SecuraCV — the platform (spelled with a capital S and capital CV; short for
  Secure Computer Vision). Lowercase "securacv" is used only in domains,
  package names and repository slugs.
- Canary — the device, and the name people say out loud.
- Errer Labs — the company behind it.
- A group of Canaries is a "fleet", never a "flock".

## How the pieces fit

Camera or sensor
  -> raw frame (private; no ordinary way to read the bytes)
  -> restricted view (enough to detect, no pixels to copy out)
  -> detection (classes and boxes, never identity)
  -> event (a short statement, a coarse time, a zone)
  -> sealed record (signed, and chained to the event before it)

Raw frames are held briefly and can only leave via break-glass, which
requires a quorum of trustee approvals.

## Glossary

### The three names people mix up

Get these right and everything else follows.

**Canary** — The device — a small, low-power witness you put on a wall, a door, or a shelf. This is the thing people point at and the name they say out loud.
  A Canary can have a camera, or radar, or neither. Several Canaries together are a fleet.
  See: https://securacv.com/lab

**SecuraCV** — The platform a Canary runs on — the witness kernel plus the signed record it keeps. It is the "how," not the "what."
  Short for Secure Computer Vision. It also runs on cameras you already own, with no Canary involved.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**witness-kernel** — The software itself — the gatekeeper every detection has to pass through before anything can be stored or sent.
  It is the part of SecuraCV you install. The homepage title and the repository are both named after it, which is why it turns up before anyone has defined it.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**Errer Labs** — The company that makes SecuraCV and holds the trademarks.
  The whole stack in one line: Errer Labs (who) makes SecuraCV (the project), whose software is the witness-kernel and whose devices are Canaries.
  See: https://securacv.com/about

### The idea

What makes this different from a security camera.

**Witnessing (not watching)** — A watcher keeps footage and can later be asked who was in it. A witness keeps a checkable record of what happened, and structurally cannot answer "who."
  This is the whole thesis. Everything below is a consequence of it.
  See: https://securacv.com/watch-over

**Event** — The unit of output: a short statement like "large object crossed boundary" or "presence in restricted zone," with a coarse time and a zone — and no identity.
  Events are what the system emits instead of video. They are text, they are small, and they are signed.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**The witness log** — The durable record: every event carries a hash of the event before it plus a signature, so the log can be added to but not silently edited or trimmed.
  It is tamper-evident: the promise is not that interference can be prevented — it is that interference becomes visible.
  See: https://securacv.com/witness

**Privacy by absence** — The surveillance features were never written, so there is no setting to turn off. Guarantees are "can't," not "won't."
  This is why there is no admin toggle for face recognition: there is no face-recognition code to toggle.
  See: https://securacv.com/about

**Coarse timestamps** — Event times are deliberately bucketed into wide windows, so the log can prove that something happened without becoming a minute-by-minute diary of your day.
  Precision is treated as a privacy cost, not a free feature.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**Verified** — A reserved word on this site. It means a cryptographic signature was checked against a key that was pinned in advance — nothing looser.
  When we mean something weaker we say "heard," "reported," or "presence." Those are never trust claims.
  See: https://securacv.com/verify

### Getting footage out

The part everyone asks about second.

**The Vault** — The sealed store where raw snapshots live. Sealed means no one — including you, including us — can open it alone.
  See: https://securacv.com/vault

**Break-glass** — The only way into the Vault: a time-limited, fully audited unseal that needs approval from several of your trustees before it will open.
  It is meant to be set up early and rehearsed before you need it, like a fire drill.
  See: https://securacv.com/vault

**Trustee** — A person you nominate who holds one approval key. A break-glass request needs some agreed number of them to sign — "n of m."
  Pick people who would not all be compelled at once. That is the point of the quorum.
  See: https://securacv.com/vault

**Evidence envelope** — What an export ships in: a self-verifying container a recipient — an insurer, a lawyer, a neighbor — can check without installing our software.
  See: https://securacv.com/verify

### The Canary line

Each one is a different sensor answering a different question.

**Canary WAP** — The recommended first build: sets itself up over its own Wi-Fi hotspot, stores to an SD card, talks to the others.
  See: https://securacv.com/compare

**Canary Vision** — The one with a camera and on-device detection — it decides what happened locally and reports the event, not the picture.
  See: https://securacv.com/compare

**Canary Sense** — Presence and breathing from 60 GHz radar, with no camera at all. Built for care and wellbeing in rooms where a camera would be wrong.
  See: https://securacv.com/compare

**Canary Sentinel** — A doorway guardian that fuses physically independent senses — motion, radar, Wi-Fi disturbance, light — so fooling one of them is not enough.
  A channel that suddenly goes blind is treated as suspicious rather than quiet.
  See: https://securacv.com/compare

**Canary Display** — The wall screens: the calm, readable surface a household actually glances at.
  See: https://securacv.com/modes

**Canary Nightlight** — A kid's bedside clock on a pocket-size 1.47-inch glass, where the screen's own glow is the night-light — no camera, no microphone, and it can hear its sibling Canaries directly over radio.
  The lamp is decor by rule: it never encodes safety or status — words on the glass carry the truth. The firmware is real; the board is compile-verified and awaiting bench validation.
  See: https://securacv.com/first-flights

**First Light** — The boxed-pair demo: a Canary Vision and a Canary Nightlight powered on a desk with nothing else — wave at the camera and the glass names what it saw, with the trigger timing it measured on itself.
  No Wi-Fi, no hub, no app, no account. The radio beacon it rides is an unsigned presence hint, so the demo shows speed and honesty, not evidence — the signed witness chain is a separate, heavier channel.
  See: https://securacv.com/first-flights

**The glass** — A display Canary's screen — the face of the device, as in "verified ✓ on the glass."
  Unrelated to break-glass, which is the ritual for opening sealed footage. Same word, two different things.
  See: https://securacv.com/modes

**Fleet** — The word for a group of Canaries. Never "flock."
  A company called Flock soured the word, so it is off-limits in our copy, product names, and code. The only exception is the unrelated Unix flock() system call.
  See: https://securacv.com/fleet

**Board tier** — How honest we are about hardware: every board is labeled either verified (proven on real hardware) or compile-tested (builds in CI, not yet bench-proven).
  We publish the distinction instead of blurring it. Much of the firmware is CI-verified and not yet hardware-verified.
  See: https://securacv.com/lab

### How Canaries talk

Three separate channels with deliberately different trust models — mixing them up is the most common misreading of the project.

**Opera** — Your household mesh: how your own Canaries stay in sync with each other, over their own low-power radio.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**Chirp** — The neighborly channel: nearby Canaries corroborating that something happened, using throwaway keys that are never stored.
  The ephemeral keys are the firewall between Chirp and your household — a corroboration cannot be walked back to your devices.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**Beacon** — A narrow, higher-trust channel for genuine life-safety advisories, held to a smoke-detector bar: boring, mostly silent, unmissable when it matters.
  Every alert needs two different devices to sign it, sensors can never fire one on their own, and it carries no descriptions of people. It is explicitly not a neighborhood-watch or suspicious-person reporting system, and not a certified life-safety device.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**Wi-Fi sensing (CSI)** — Detecting movement from how a room disturbs the Wi-Fi already passing through it. No camera, no microphone.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

**Presence (vs. verified)** — The deliberately weak claim: "I heard this device recently." Self-reported, unsigned, and never a security boundary.
  See: https://securacv.com/fleet

**TOFU pinning** — Trust on first use: a device remembers the key it met the first time and refuses a different one later, so a swap is noticed.
  It does not prove the first key was the right one — it proves nothing changed since. That is a smaller claim than it sounds, and it is the honest one.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

### Things you can actually open

Most of these run in your browser, right now, with no hardware.

**The Lab** — The real shipping firmware, compiled to run inside your browser: flash a simulated blank chip, watch it boot, and check the cryptographic birth certificate it just generated.
  Nothing is installed and no hardware is needed. It is the fastest honest answer to "does this actually work?"
  See: https://securacv.com/lab

**The Flasher** — The app that writes firmware onto a real board and then keeps an eye on it. There is a browser version and a desktop version.
  See: https://securacv.com/download

**The Hatchery** — The Lab's optional guided version: the same six stations, walked end to end as one story instead of browsed as a directory.
  You can close it at any point and go back to picking stations yourself; it remembers where you were.
  See: https://securacv.com/lab

**A bench (or station)** — One hands-on stop inside the Lab — a single thing you can open and poke, like wiring a part or flashing a board.
  See: https://securacv.com/lab

**The Showroom** — Every enclosure in 3D, turned over in your browser, with the parts list beside it.
  There are no product photos anywhere on this site; the Showroom renders the actual committed CAD instead.
  See: https://securacv.com/showroom

**The Workshop** — The print bench: spin the real STL files in your own filament color before you print one.
  See: https://securacv.com/lab

**The Playground** — The wiring bench: attach a real peripheral to a real board layout and watch it wake up.
  See: https://securacv.com/playground

**The Factory** — The walkthrough of how a blank chip becomes a Canary — and how to check the birth certificate it gets on the way.
  See: https://securacv.com/factory

**First Flights** — Small builds that earn their keep on day one — the "what would I actually do with this?" page.
  See: https://securacv.com/first-flights

**The Engine Room** — How the company itself runs, published in the open: operations, costs, and the parts that are automated.
  See: https://securacv.com/engine

**Find your path** — The index of every door into SecuraCV, sorted by what you came to do rather than by what things are called.
  See: https://securacv.com/paths

**Canary Doctor** — The symptom-first help flow: describe what's wrong, get the self-test and the fix.
  See: https://securacv.com/checkup

**Sticker check** — Scan the sticker on a Canary and confirm in your browser that the device is the one it claims to be. Nothing is uploaded.
  See: https://securacv.com/verify

**Randomart** — A little ASCII picture generated from a device's key, so a person can compare identities at a glance instead of reading a long string of hex.
  See: https://securacv.com/verify

**The Builder** — Fit an enclosure to your exact hardware with dropdowns and get a printable 3D file out, all in the browser.
  See: https://securacv.com/builder

**The Witness Wall** — The big-screen surface for homes and venues: the verified record on the shared screen, not a grid of live feeds.
  See: https://securacv.com/apple-tv

**The Hub** — A Raspberry Pi running Home Assistant with SecuraCV on it — the piece that ties cameras, Canaries, and your dashboard together. It runs headless by default (no monitor, no keyboard); plug in an HDMI touchscreen and an optional extra can show your dashboard right on it.
  See: https://securacv.com/linux

### Making and selling

The project is open all the way down, on purpose.

**Maker Corps** — The four-tier maker community: how someone goes from printing one case to building kits for other people.
  See: https://securacv.com/corps

**Works with SecuraCV** — A badge anyone can earn for free, under a published trademark policy — the anti-lock-in promise in a sticker.
  See: https://securacv.com/vendors

**Warrant canary** — A public statement we update to say what we have and have not been compelled to hand over. Its absence is the signal.
  See: https://securacv.com/transparency

## Frequently asked questions

### Does it do face recognition?

No — and it can't. There is no face-recognition code in the project to enable or disable, and the same is true of license-plate reading, gait analysis, and age/gender/race estimation. The things it can report are "person," "vehicle," "animal," "package" — never "who." This is a rule about what exists, not a setting.
  See: https://securacv.com/watch-over

### Can someone watch a live feed of my house?

Not through any normal path — there isn't one. Raw footage lives briefly in a sealed store with no ordinary way out. Opening it takes break-glass: a time-limited, audited unseal that needs several of your trustees to approve. No single person can do it alone, including you and including us.
  See: https://securacv.com/vault

### So how do I get footage after an actual break-in?

You run break-glass with your trustees, and the export comes out as a self-verifying file an insurer or a lawyer can check without our software. Set the trustees up early and rehearse it once — it is a fire drill, not a feature you discover on the worst day.
  See: https://securacv.com/vault

### Does it phone home? Do I need an account?

No and no. Records stay on your hardware, there is no telemetry, and nothing about the system requires an account to run. The site itself sets no cookies — a claim we keep enforced in the test suite rather than just written on a page.
  See: https://securacv.com/privacy

### How do I know the record wasn't edited?

Every entry carries a fingerprint of the entry before it plus a signature, so removing or altering anything breaks the chain and verification fails loudly. You can check it yourself, offline, with our verifier or your own — that is what tamper-evident means here.
  See: https://securacv.com/verify

### What actually breaks these guarantees?

A compromised computer. If an attacker owns the machine the software runs on, the promises that depend on that machine no longer hold. We write that down rather than gloss over it, and the threat model in the source spells out what survives and what doesn't.
  See: https://securacv.com/how-it-works

### Is this finished? Can I buy one today?

Partly. It is real, open, and running — but treat it as work in progress: some Canaries have released firmware and some are still in development, and much of the firmware is proven in continuous integration rather than on a bench. Every board says which it is. There are no certification claims, and the radios still need the regulatory work that selling them legally requires.
  See: https://securacv.com/compare

### Do I have to buy anything from you?

No. Print the case, buy the parts wherever you like, and flash it yourself — the whole path is open under Apache-2.0. Kits exist for people who would rather not, and independent sellers can offer their own under the free "Works with SecuraCV" badge.
  See: https://securacv.com/vendors

### What's the fastest way to see whether this is real?

Open the Lab. It runs the actual device firmware inside your browser — flash a simulated blank chip, watch it come up, and check the cryptographic birth certificate it just made. No hardware, no install, nothing uploaded.
  See: https://securacv.com/lab

### How do I ask for a feature?

Say it in one sentence on the Community Ideas board. It becomes a public suggestion anyone can back with a thumbs-up, and the most-backed ones are what get built next — that is genuinely how the roadmap is ordered, not a slogan. You need no technical vocabulary and no idea how any of this works: "I wish it would text me when it sees motion" is a complete, useful request. A reply arrives straight away telling you what happens next.
  See: https://securacv.com/ideas

### Why do I need GitHub to suggest something?

Because it puts your idea in the same place as the work, which buys you things a private suggestion form cannot. You can watch the code that answers your idea get written and reviewed, and see which release it ships in. Your words are public, and the everyday moves leave a trail: we can moderate our own tracker like any owner can, but an edited comment keeps a visible edit history and a closed idea shows who closed it and when, so declining one is done out loud with a reason you can read. Deletion is the honest exception — an owner can remove a thread outright and nothing is left behind, so on that one point you have our word rather than a guarantee. Votes are reactions from real accounts, so the counts are checkable rather than something you take on trust. And we never ask for your email, because we keep no list to put it on. The cost is real though: one free account, about thirty seconds, and an unfamiliar page the first time — and if that is too much, the feedback desk takes plain email instead.
  See: https://securacv.com/ideas

### Which Canary should I get or build first?

Canary WAP for a general first device; Canary Vision if you want a camera with on-device detection; Canary Sense for presence and breathing with no camera at all; Canary Sentinel for a doorway that is hard to sneak past; Canary Display for a screen the household glances at.
  See: https://securacv.com/compare

## Troubleshooting — the Help Desk catalog

The symptom-first fixes from https://securacv.com/help, restated from the
firmware's own diagnostics (sources cited per entry in js/help-catalog.js).
If a user describes one of these symptoms, answer with these steps and
link the entry.

### Power & cable

**It won't turn on — no light, no screen, nothing** — This is usually power delivery or the cable — not a dead board.
  1. Swap in a USB-C cable you know carries data — charge-only cables look identical and are the single most common cause.
  2. Plug straight into the computer or a powered hub, not an unpowered hub or a keyboard port.
  3. If your Canary has a battery and an ON/OFF slide switch, check the switch — it cuts the battery, not USB.
  4. Watch closely at plug-in: a brief flicker then dark points at power, and the "won't stay up" entry below has the rest.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-wont-turn-on

**It resets or dies on its own — won't stay up** — A brownout: the board is not getting enough power to stay up. It is a supply problem, not a firmware problem.
  1. Move to a USB port directly on the computer — unpowered hubs and long cables drop voltage under load.
  2. Swap in a shorter, known-good USB-C data cable.
  3. On battery: the cell may be flat or the tray contact loose — try USB power alone to confirm.
  4. Once the supply is right it boots normally by itself. There is nothing to reinstall.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-brownout

### Flashing & the port

**The flasher says the port is busy** — Another program or browser tab is holding the board.
  1. Close the Arduino IDE, any PlatformIO serial monitor, and any other flasher tab.
  2. Unplug, replug, and try again.
  3. On Linux the holder is often ModemManager probing a just-plugged board — wait about 30 seconds, or add the udev rule from the desktop Flasher's install notes so it ignores Canaries for good.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-port-busy

**It connects, but flashing says it isn't answering** — The board is almost certainly not in download mode.
  1. Hold BOOT, tap RESET, release BOOT — then reconnect and try again.
  2. On a board with no RESET button: hold BOOT while plugging the cable in.
  3. Still nothing? Try the other USB-C port if the board has two — only one talks to the flasher.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-not-in-download

**The board disappears partway through** — The connection dropped — usually the cable, the port, or the board resetting.
  1. Reseat the USB-C cable — a data cable, not charge-only — and prefer a shorter one.
  2. Try a different port, then reconnect and retry.
  3. Nothing was harmed: the flasher verifies before and after it writes, and it makes a safety copy first.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-device-lost

**The system won't grant access to the port** — An operating-system permission or a missing USB-serial driver.
  1. Linux: add yourself to the dialout group (sudo usermod -aG dialout $USER), then log out and back in.
  2. Windows: install the USB-serial driver for the board's bridge chip, then reconnect.
  3. macOS usually needs nothing — if it still refuses, try another cable and port first.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-port-permission

### Lights

**The light blinks in counted groups** — That is the Canary telling you exactly what is wrong — the number of blinks in each group is the message.
  1. Count the blinks in one group (there is a pause between groups).
  2. Match the count in the blink decoder below.
  3. No rush: after about 30 seconds of any error group it goes back to trying on its own, and every retry re-announces its state.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-blinking-groups

**A red light is always on — can I turn it off?** — On most boards that steady red is the charge/power LED. It is wired to the power rail itself, so no firmware setting can turn it off — ours or anyone's.
  1. It is normal whenever the board is powered or charging — it is not an error.
  2. The witness's own status LED is different: it goes dark once enrolled, on purpose. A witness shouldn't glow.
  3. If the glow bothers a bedroom, the honest fix is physical — orientation, the enclosure, or a small piece of tape.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-red-light-always-on

### Wi-Fi & first setup

**I can't find the SecuraCV-XXXX network** — The Canary raises its own setup network shortly after power-on; phones sometimes need a nudge to show or keep it.
  1. Give it about 30 seconds after power-on, and stand near the device.
  2. Phones that auto-switch back to home Wi-Fi will drop it — turn off auto-join for a minute while you set up.
  3. Power-cycle once: the setup network re-announces itself on every boot.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-cant-see-ap

**It rejected my Wi-Fi password (blinks in groups of 2)** — The Canary heard your network but the password did not work. It stays in setup so you can try again — the setup network never drops.
  1. Re-open the setup page and re-enter the password — watch for auto-capitalization and trailing spaces.
  2. At the edge of Wi-Fi range, a weak signal can read as a wrong password: move the Canary closer for setup, then put it back.
  3. The light confirms it: groups of 2 means exactly this, nothing else.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-wrong-wifi-password

**It joins Wi-Fi but never finishes (groups of 3)** — It reached your network but never got an address, or the access point stopped answering.
  1. Check the network is 2.4 GHz — the radio in every Canary is 2.4 GHz, and a 5 GHz-only network is invisible to it.
  2. Look for a router setting limiting new clients (client caps, "AP isolation", MAC filtering).
  3. If other devices are struggling too, restart the router — then just wait: the Canary keeps retrying on its own.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-no-ip

**The setup page never popped up** — Some phones never raise the sign-in sheet. The page is still there — you can walk in the front door.
  1. Stay on the Canary's network and open http://192.168.4.1 in your browser yourself.
  2. On Android, if it offers "use this network as is", accept — leaving the network closes the page.
  3. A Canary with a screen says the same thing after a few seconds: "no page? open 192.168.4.1".
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-captive-portal-missing

**The add-a-canary code won't take (groups of 5)** — Setup codes are single-use and expire on purpose. Groups of 5 means the code was stale or already spent; two long blinks means it could not be read at all.
  1. Make a fresh code on the display or hub and scan again — a new one costs nothing.
  2. For two long blinks (unreadable): more light, hold steadier, make the code bigger on screen.
  3. If it keeps failing, the Lab's Fix-it flow walks the whole join, step by step, on an emulated Canary.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-code-expired

### Hub & fleet

**It says the hub is unreachable (groups of 4)** — Wi-Fi is fine — the thing it cannot reach is your hub. That is a different fix than Wi-Fi, which is why the light says so distinctly.
  1. Check the hub itself is up — can you open Home Assistant from your phone?
  2. If the hub got a new address (new router, new DHCP lease), the fleet re-finds it by itself; power-cycling the Canary forces a fresh look right now.
  3. Never configured a hub? Then this is the one state that genuinely needs you: the Canary works locally but has nobody to report to.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-hub-unreachable

**A witness shows stale or lost on the wall** — The display has not heard from that Canary lately — the question is whether the Canary or the network went quiet.
  1. Check the quiet Canary is powered and its own light looks normal.
  2. Both devices must be on the same network — guest networks and VLANs often block discovery.
  3. After any router change, give it a minute: the display re-finds the fleet by itself, continuously.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-stale-witness

**No ✓ verified badge, or verification failed** — The record's signature did not check out against a pinned key — or this device was never pinned. "Heard" and "verified" are different words here on purpose.
  1. A brand-new Canary shows unverified until its key is pinned at first meeting — that is the system being honest, not broken.
  2. A device you had already pinned suddenly mismatching is worth your attention: it was reflashed or reset (new key), or it is not the same device. Re-pin only when you know which.
  3. You can verify a physical Canary's sticker in the browser, nothing uploaded.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-not-verified

### Device health

**The self-test says a probe failed** — Every probe carries its own written fix, straight from the firmware — the Doctor shows the exact one for whatever failed.
  1. Open the Canary Doctor and run the self-test; tap any failed probe for its fix, in order.
  2. A Canary without an SD card reads about 90% on purpose — one probe reports "no card", and if that is deliberate, nothing is wrong.
  3. On a real device the same test is one request: GET /api/selftest on its dashboard.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-probe-failed

**It says safe mode or recovery mode** — It crashed repeatedly and parked itself somewhere safe on purpose — and it saved the crash evidence, so the "why" never needs a serial cable.
  1. Open its dashboard: the wizard shows the reset reason and the boot-stage breadcrumb it saved.
  2. Address the cause it names — brownouts want the power steps above, not a reinstall.
  3. Then tap "Retry full boot" on the dashboard. If it lands back in safe mode, a clean install from the flasher lays down a fresh image.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-safe-mode

**Bluetooth doesn't show up** — BLE is several different failures wearing one name — the bring-up ladder names the first rung that failed. And the honest one: BLE ships only in the full build, because it does not fit the smaller update slots.
  1. Run the Bluetooth ladder on the Doctor — it stops at the first failed rung and says what to do there.
  2. If it says "not compiled in", that is the whole answer: flash the full build if you need BLE.
  3. Connected but nothing readable? Give it a few seconds after boot — the service starts after the radios settle.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-ble-not-working

**It boots, crashes, boots again** — The firmware is crashing at startup — usually stale settings a previous firmware left behind, which a clean install wipes.
  1. Connect to the flasher and choose a clean install — it makes a safety copy of the board before writing anything.
  2. If it still loops afterward, let the flasher read the boot log: it recognizes the fatal signatures and names the fix.
  3. A loop that only happens on certain power (battery, a specific port) is the brownout entry above wearing a costume.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-crash-on-boot

### Updates & recovery

**An update failed, or it won't finish updating** — Updates only ever write the app slots — the first-stage bootloader is factory silicon and no update touches it. A USB flash can always bring the device back.
  1. Power-cycle once. If it comes up on the previous version, that is the design working — it kept the image it trusted.
  2. If it will not come up at all: connect by USB and flash. Recovery by cable is always there, and an update cannot take it away.
  3. Updates also refuse to start on low battery on purpose — charge first if it keeps declining.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-ota-failed

**I changed my Wi-Fi and now it's gone** — It cannot join a network it has never met. Every Canary recovers the same way: by raising its own setup network.
  1. Give it a minute or two: a Canary that cannot join for a reason you can fix raises its own setup network — connect to SecuraCV-XXXX and enter the new details.
  2. The sensor Canaries (Vision, Sense) do this too, and keep sensing while the setup network is up — a Wi-Fi change used to mean a USB reflash for them, and no longer does. A reflash with the new details still works, any time.
  3. After rejoining, the fleet finds the hub again by itself.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-wifi-changed

### Physical parts

**A printed part cracked or a clip snapped** — Every plastic part is an open file. The fix is a fresh part — never a return.
  1. Find your part: the Builder generates it in the browser, and the print checklist names settings that survive real use.
  2. Print it yourself, or any local print service can — the files are the product.
  3. Bought it from us and it failed on its own? Claim it: we ship the smallest thing that makes it right, and you keep or recycle the original. Nothing ever ships back.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-broken-part

**I think the hardware is genuinely dead** — Let's prove it before anything ships — most "dead" boards turn out to be a cable, a power port, or download mode. Proving it takes two minutes and saves a pointless package.
  1. Walk the "won't turn on" and "isn't answering" entries above — they clear most cases.
  2. Then connect to the flasher and copy its one-click diagnostic report. It contains only safe-to-share facts — no Wi-Fi secrets, no keys, by construction.
  3. Email the report with your order email. A proven fault ships the smallest replacement one way — you never mail anything back, so nothing rides a courier twice.
  See: https://securacv.com/help#s-dead-board

### The LED blink grammar

The status light is count-coded: the number of blinks in each group is the
message.

- A brief blink about once a second: Waiting for a setup code — it is scanning. Show it a fresh code from the display or hub. Nothing is wrong.
- 3 quick blinks, then half a second solid: Code read successfully. Nothing to do — it is moving on to Wi-Fi.
- Rapid, even blinking: Joining Wi-Fi right now. Give it a moment.
- Double-blink, then a pause: Wi-Fi is up; it is looking for your hub. Normal for a few seconds. Minutes of this becomes "hub unreachable" below.
- Solid for ~3 seconds, then dark: Enrolled. A witness shouldn't glow. Done — dark is the goal state.
- Blinks in groups of 2: Wrong Wi-Fi password. Re-enter it on the setup page — the setup network is still up. Watch for auto-capitalization.
- Blinks in groups of 3: No IP address / access point unreachable. Check the network is 2.4 GHz and the router is not limiting new clients.
- Blinks in groups of 4: Hub unreachable. Wi-Fi is fine — check the hub is up. The fleet re-finds a moved hub by itself.
- Blinks in groups of 5: Setup code expired or already used. Make a fresh code and scan again.
- 2 long blinks: It could not read the code. More light, steadier hand, bigger code on the screen.

After about 30 seconds of any error group, the Canary returns to scanning on its own — and every retry re-announces its state. It never sits in a silent loop.

## Every page on the site

### See it work

- [The Lab](https://securacv.com/lab): Every Canary, from egg to nest — explore the whole line.
- [The Showroom](https://securacv.com/showroom): Turn every enclosure over in 3D, parts list included.
- [The Story](https://securacv.com/story): Scroll and the reveal drives itself — the camera flies, the case opens, the invisible fields appear.
- [View in Your Room](https://securacv.com/view-in-room): Drop a real-scale Canary onto your wall in AR — rendered on your device, nothing uploaded.
- [The Render Lab](https://securacv.com/render-lab): Tune every material layer of a Canary live — CAD-like, in your browser.
- [The Fleet, Drawn](https://securacv.com/figures): One isometric figure of every device, part, board and tool — and an honest ladder from shipping down to still-an-idea.
- [The Playground](https://securacv.com/playground): Wire real parts onto a real board and watch them wake up.
- [Display Modes](https://securacv.com/modes): One wall display, five gears — play the firmware's real demo storyline.
- [Apple TV Emulator](https://securacv.com/witness-wall): Drive the Witness Wall on a simulated Apple TV — focus engine, remote, both editions.
- [Through Canary Eyes](https://securacv.com/eyes): Lend your webcam a minute — watch a scene become edges, edges become a record you can check.
- [How It Works](https://securacv.com/how-it-works): The whole trick, in plain language.
- [Glossary](https://securacv.com/glossary): Every word we use — Canary, witness log, break-glass, fleet — defined once.
- [One Witness](https://securacv.com/witness): A camera, a notary, and a vault — fused into one device.
- [The Vault](https://securacv.com/vault): Footage no one can open alone.
- [The Factory](https://securacv.com/factory): How a blank chip becomes a Canary — and how to check its birth certificate.
- [Why Linux](https://securacv.com/linux): Do you need a computer? Tiny screen vs. Raspberry Pi.

### Build one

- [Makers](https://securacv.com/maker): Are you a maker? The Corps starts here.
- [The Maker Corps](https://securacv.com/corps): How the four tiers work, and how to climb them.
- [The Builder](https://securacv.com/builder): Fit a case to your hardware — dropdowns in, STL out, all in your browser.
- [Print One](https://securacv.com/print): The enclosure build checklist, layer by layer.
- [Case Label](https://securacv.com/label): Print the FCC/IC/CE label for the outside of the case — rule-checked and print-exact.
- [The Gallery](https://securacv.com/gallery): Builds from makers like you — add yours.
- [Have One Made](https://securacv.com/request): Ask a maker to build yours.
- [The Vendors](https://securacv.com/vendors): Independent sellers of kits, parts, and prints — and how to join them.
- [The Ecosystem](https://securacv.com/ecosystem): How parts, prints, and kits reach people — engineered to run itself.
- [The Engine Room](https://securacv.com/engine): Open operations — the company that runs itself.
- [The Numbers](https://securacv.com/economics): Can one person make a living building these? A live break-even calculator.
- [Community Ideas](https://securacv.com/ideas): Suggest and vote on what we build next — no GitHub know-how needed.

### Choose yours

- [Store](https://securacv.com/store): Kits and bundles, sold as a fleet.
- [Compare & Kits](https://securacv.com/compare): Which Canary is the one that's yours?
- [First Flights](https://securacv.com/first-flights): Seven small builds that earn their keep on day one — some fly now, the rest are a vote away.
- [Vision Pro](https://securacv.com/pro-camera): Coming soon — starlight low-light imaging, wired into the witness kernel.
- [Apple TV](https://securacv.com/apple-tv): Coming soon — the Witness Wall on the big screen, for home or venue.
- [Herald](https://securacv.com/kitchen-note): Coming soon — a plug-in e-paper kitchen placard: your typed note in about a second, plus a calm honest status line.
- [Download the Lab](https://securacv.com/download): The Lab as a native app — Mac and Linux today.
- [For Industry](https://securacv.com/industry): On-device vision for safety and ops — fixed-price, remote, no footage leaves the site.
- [Watched Over](https://securacv.com/watch-over): Watched over, never watched — what we believe.

### Care for yours

- [Your Canary](https://securacv.com/canary): Everything your Canary can do — help & recovery.
- [The Help Desk](https://securacv.com/help): Say what you see — every path ends in a fix, a rehearsal, or a handoff. No dead ends.
- [Plug It In](https://securacv.com/plugin): See what happens on your computer, before you plug in.
- [Unflashed Boards](https://securacv.com/board-safety): Bought a bare board? Hold BOOT while you plug it in — and what our flasher checks before writing.
- [Canary Doctor](https://securacv.com/checkup): Self-tests and demos — is yours feeling okay?
- [Away From Home](https://securacv.com/away): See your Canaries from anywhere, free — and the shortcuts that publish your front door.
- [Your Fleet](https://securacv.com/fleet): Who your Canary hears nearby, live.
- [Apple Home](https://securacv.com/apple-home): Your Canaries as ordinary HomeKit sensors — for Siri and automations, with no video and no identity.
- [Sticker Check](https://securacv.com/verify): Scan a Canary's sticker and check it's the real thing — in your browser, nothing uploaded.

### Company

- [About](https://securacv.com/about): Who makes SecuraCV, and why — Errer Labs and the privacy-by-absence thesis.
- [Contact](https://securacv.com/contact): Reach a real human — email, press, distribution, and security disclosure.
- [Transparency](https://securacv.com/transparency): Our warrant canary and what we can — and can't — be compelled to hand over.
- [Terms of Sale](https://securacv.com/terms-of-sale): Payment, shipping, returns, and the fix-not-return warranty.
- [Terms of Service](https://securacv.com/terms): Using the site and the open-source software, in plain terms.
- [Privacy](https://securacv.com/privacy): The privacy policy, in the open.

### Also on the site

- [Find Your Path](https://securacv.com/paths): Every door into SecuraCV, sorted by what you came to do.
- [Demo Board](https://securacv.com/demo): One page, every button — jump to everything we just shipped.
- [Feedback](https://securacv.com/feedback): Tell us what's working, what snagged, or just say hi.

## Status and limits

Work in progress, and deliberately explicit about it:

- Some Canaries have released firmware; others are still in development. Each
  board is labeled either "verified" (proven on real hardware) or
  "compile-tested" (builds in CI, not yet bench-proven).
- Much of the firmware is CI-verified rather than hardware-verified. Version 1
  is being held until that changes.
- No certification claims — no FIPS, no Common Criteria. Selling the radios
  legally still needs FCC/CE work, and a third-party security audit has not
  happened yet.
- The record is tamper-evident, not interference-proof: the promise is that
  tampering becomes visible, not that it can be prevented.
- Nothing here is legal or security advice, and security depends on correct
  implementation and an uncompromised host computer.

## Source

- Code and specs: https://github.com/kmay89/securaCV (Apache-2.0)
- Developer glossary: https://github.com/kmay89/securaCV/blob/main/docs/GLOSSARY.md
- Developer FAQ: https://github.com/kmay89/securaCV/blob/main/docs/FAQ.md
- Privacy invariants: https://github.com/kmay89/securaCV/blob/main/spec/invariants.md
- Threat model: https://github.com/kmay89/securaCV/blob/main/spec/threat_model.md
- Brief for AI coding agents: https://github.com/kmay89/securaCV/blob/main/AGENTS.md