Can IR LEDs hurt the human eye? Yes.
It depends on the power, how focused the light is, your distance from it and duration of exposure.
The major problem with infrared light is you can't see it, your eyes have no reaction to it until the damage has been done and then you feel a painful sensation and your vision is blurry. That is a very dangerous thing indeed.
How do I know this? It just happened to me last night. I used my Foscam 8910w to watch me at night to observe my sleep apnea. This was at a range of about 5 feet. It was centered more on my stomach than directly at my eyes, but my eyes still received peripheral light, which was enough to damage my eye. My right eye was more exposed to the light as my left side was on the pillow.
Since I recorded it I know exactly how long and how it looked. Luckily my body woke itself up because it knew something was wrong. This is with my eyelids closed the whole time, which apparently doesn't stop the light from damaging the eyes. Total time facing the light was approximately 110 minutes, at about 5 feet, with eyelids closed the whole time.
When I woke up my right eye was itching and vision was blurry. I just thought it was sleep in my eye or it's irritated. No amount of blinking or rubbing would clear it up. I then washed it with water. It didn't help. I then flushed my eye with water directly using a soft stream from the shower head. My vision was still blurry in my right eye. I held my hand over my right eye, left-eye vision was focused. Held my hand over my left eye and my right-eye vision was blurry and double. Normally even with something in your eye your vision isn't blurry just obscured wherever the debris is. Then I thought it must be the IR light.
Now I had never read anything about IR light from an indoor cam being dangerous and there are no warnings on the box or documentation at all about it. But it is a very dangerous thing and after my experience I wouldn't advise using a camera with IR as a monitor pointing on anyone while they sleep. Use normal low light and a good camera that can see in low light.
It's not worth taking a chance at losing vision or partial vision with IR, especially with a baby that can't tell you what is wrong. I'm depressed and upset about the whole experience. I'm still recovering from the damage and my vision in my right eye has returned to near normal, not blurry, double-vision like it was. Both of my eyes are strained and have a dull pain in the back. I hate to think about what would have happened if I had slept all night like that.
