“Why won’t you pull that piece of tape off your webcam? What are you hiding?”
If people know you have something, they start pressuring you to use it.
When I bought my Dell Inspiron two years ago, I had the option of not having a webcam installed. A quick look at their web site suggests that it’s still optional.
Are you serious? I have a webcam on my laptop. I think I used it a total of two times in the last four years. I’ve never been pressured to use one (seriously, who does that?) Second, how many people are ever going to get the chance to even see my computer to make that observation?
edit: I should make it clear that I’m responding to the general aversion of webcams, not the security issue in the OP. In that case, no, tape would not be a solution.
Easy enough to disable the webcam in the device manager in Windows, or probably in the CMOS settings on some computers, or, as others have suggested, stick a bit of tape over it - because insisting on no webcam is at the moment on the borderline of inconveniencing yourself by limiting the choice of devices in your market - in the near future, searching for a laptop with no webcam will be like searching for one with a built in floppy drive.
Just seems a weirdly specific thing to be paranoid about.
(to the aversion of webcams issue - not the OP - understood that there is some absolute requirement for a non-camera device here)
If a hacker did remotely activate my webcam, I’d be much more concerned at all the financial records and passwords that they’d also have access to. My webcam? If you insist on seeing my hairy ass change in the morning I suppose that’s your prerogative.
Can’t you smash the webcam?
It is an option for most Dell laptops, not a requirement. SOME offers only allow a few, if any, customizations and may not allow the removal of a webcam; you can just look for a different offer or start with a base config and customize it.
At the risk of inflaming screaming fanboi’s, I have no idea if Apple forces you to have what Apple wants you to have when it comes to Mac laptops, meaning are webcams options or not on Macs? It’s just the sort of thing Apple would do, however – tell you what you want rather than ask. And make you glad you paid for it too!
Thanks for all the info everyone. I hadn’t thought to look at corporate models. I had been looking to replace my Sony Vaio, but it seems that Sony force a webcam on you. Not everyone is so Orwellian.
I’d looked at some Dells and the ones I looked at all had a non-optional camera. Guess I didn’t try hard enough 
The covering the lens with tape option might work, but the security goons have guns :eek:
I’m in the UK today. Second time I’ve been here this year!
None of these Toshiba laptops have an integrated webcam but all of the business laptops have 
In the US at least, the only choice was Dell or HP. I ended up choosing an HP EliteBook 8540w because it had slightly more features. I mean come on - USB 3 ports? All I nned now is some USB 3 devices to plug into them. But I’m a boy and I have my toy.