Help Removing Physical Camera

[shfrazie]

I need to remove my camera device from my HTC Aria. I would appreciate any advice or thoughts about this before I tackle the problem. I cannot take a phone with a camera into work.

 

[lilhaiti]

My advice. Get another phone like a cheap go-phone just for work and change the sim back and forth.

 

[Jofaba]

where the hell do you work?!

 

[anika200]

Can you just make a little silver "plug" to put in the camera lens recess? I would try that first or possibly make a whole new piece to fit over the speaker camera area to block the camera.

 

[RocketRay]

Tell your employer it's 2010 and nearly all phones come with a camera and to provide electronics lockers where you can put your phone before entering a restricted area.

Otherwise leave it in your car?

 

[shfrazie]

Thanks for the suggestions. I will do some research about what solution will work for for my employer. Believe it or not there are some companies that don't allow cameras because of the secure nature and private information at the work place.

 

[lily0830]

Removing the camera might damage your phone. Why not wrap it with a case to hide the camera? haha

 

[shfrazie]

I was able to remove the camera because it just plugs into the circuit board. Though it was deceiving because when you first take the cover off it doesn't look like you can remove the camera without desoldiering it. Upon more investigation I figured out that the camera pokes through the circuit board and plugs in to the board on the other side that is hidden. So with some careful work and patience I was able to wiggle the camera out of the phone. The last thing for me to do was to fill in the camera hole on the piece of plastic with JB Weld to make sure that the camera cannot be used. Thanks for all the feedback.

 

[Jofaba]

Great, now you can't use Layar, Goggles, Barcode Scanner etc. That stinks =(

 

[shfrazie]

That is okay since I can sacrifice somethings just to have the phone at work.

 

[PIANOFINGERS]

I need to do the same thing to my Phone, its a shame they all come with Cameras.
Do you need to remove the 2 screws on top or all four screws to get access?

 

[shfrazie]

If I remember right, the tri wing screw driver is only need to remove the top two screws (you can pickup one of these specialty screwdrivers on eBay). After that you might need a tiny phillips screwdriver but I don't remember for sure. Good luck and remember not to force anything.