Interesting read in the Daily Mail today about a doctor whose taken her neighbour to court as they had a RING doorbell and she claimed it invaded her
privacy under data protection laws
The judge has agreed with her and the RING owners now face a potential £100,000 claim
These cameras are everywhere, Surely if you aren't doing anything wrong you've got nowt to worry about and they have proved useful in
looking after peoples cars on driveways and garages
BUT the neighbour has won...
Just thinking there must be more to this one than meets the eye?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10085561/A-victory-privacy-Woman-100k-damages-neighbours-doorbell-cameras.html
"If you aren't doing anything wrong you've got nowt to worry about"
Fair comment, but many paope simply don't want (or like) to be filmed/visible to others.
"Just thinking there must be more to this one than meets the eye? "
Possibly - although the Daily Mail (like all newspapers) loves a good story.
I expect it'll end up with RING getting buyers of their products to sign some form of waiver that puts all responsibility on the
owner/installer/operator of the camera to comply with all applicable laws.
Neighbour of mine who's a mobile electrician installed an IP camera system a while back on the eaves of his house to monitor his work van after
an attempted break-in. Before installing he asked neighbours a few doors each way if they had any objections. Being the camera looks onto his own
drive and the street and nobody elses property no neighbours had any issue.
I think its a missed point that anyone with CCTV that covers outside of their property (Which a doorbell almost always does) needs to have a sign up
to meet GDPR regs. Once a sign is up thats pretty much all you need to do. After that its only a matter of following a few basic rules which are
usually inherent in most CCTV systems (ie secure, deleted after a reasonable time), Then you just need to be compliant and delete or provide footage
to anyone captured outside of your property boundary.
https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/domestic-cctv-systems-guidance-for-people-using-cctv/
Sound like this block decided to get difficult about those last few requirements.
[Edited on 13-10-21 by loggyboy]
It's an inaccurate article. The issue wasn't the doorbell it was all the other cameras and the fact that the owner said some where dummies when they weren't. Clearly the ring doorbell itself pointed into the road and wouldn't be invading privacy. Personally I can't be bothered to pay the monthly fee so just use mine live- sorts out the issue. If I wanted a cctv install I'd do it properly with privacy areas etc.
But the Ring doorbell didn't even point at her house?
Suspect Ring will just use some AWS to use AI to filter out background in private areas in an upcoming update. IE use a smart blur to obscure private areas but allow things moving in front of it to be seen.
Back when I worked in CCTV software (10 years ago), audio was a big no no and against the CCTV Code of Conduct. Admittedly I don't know what regs are in place today, but I suspect turning audio off would've prevented the ruling.
So if I'm reading the link correctly (thanks for sharing that) If you had a system that was only triggered when someone came within your
boundary, there isn't a problem under the reg's as its within your land and not filming all the time ?
The neighbour has one and the police used the images to charge the dickhead who'd been fiddling with their car, No warning sign displayed and the
police never mentioned it..
quote:
Originally posted by perksy
So if I'm reading the link correctly (thanks for sharing that) If you had a system that was only triggered when someone came within your boundary, there isn't a problem under the reg's as its within your land and not filming all the time ?
The neighbour has one and the police used the images to charge the dickhead who'd been fiddling with their car, No warning sign displayed and the police never mentioned it..
We have had issues here so I had a proper look at the regs - they are very long and wordy so this is my interpretation and may have inaccuracies but I think follows the general intentions of the regs. My camera films just my property - no problem - if it went beyond and captured other peoples movements and I delete regularly (monthly) - no problem - I keep the video more than a month I have to provide anything I may have to a person requesting that which shows them - I also have signs indicating recording is taking place as is required. I think the issue with doorbells is that they film looking away from a door and will capture not only people calling but also the footpath/ street/ passing cars and pedestrians as well as recording the audio and the video recorded is not wiped regularly and no signs are present indicating recording. I've not looked at accurate details of the case in question (accurate not press reports) so haven't had chance to see what the decision has been based on.
Part of the purpose of my CCTV is to cover the public area outside my house, because that's where one of my cars is, and where theiving barstools
approached from to steal my rare (but knackered) gearbox from a spot at the side of my garage, 20m off the road.
I set my cameras up to black out the neighbours gardens/windows. I don't black out the view of their drive or property, and they've asked
for footage in the past to help with delivery claims. I loop record to a HDD in my house, I think the loop lasts about a week and then
self-overwrites.
If you're not an asshat, generally you're fine.
quote:
Back when I worked in CCTV software (10 years ago), audio was a big no no and against the CCTV Code of Conduct. Admittedly I don't know what regs are in place today, but I suspect turning audio off would've prevented the ruling.
It's not that audio isn't allowed, just that in most cctv situations it would be considered excessive and intrusive. There's no right to privacy in a public place- the issue is when the filming also catches people on private property.
I think "in most situations" is a stretch - my cameras are 10m from any boundary, they can't hear anything that isn't on my
property.
There's no right to privacy in a public place, and this stretches to places visible from a public place, unless there's reasonable
assumption of privacy. In your front garden isn't one of those places. In your bedroom window is.
I was about to add the point about filming public places. My cameras catch the shared drive & street across to neighbours. Police asked for
evidence, I provided it.
On my street we also have two professional setups with number plate capture. Anytime their is a problem the police go visit then. Their evidence
helped capture the people who tried to burgle me (and they admitted about 50 other offenses). This is what prompted me to get a camera
As we thought, A bit more to this than meets the eye...
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-58911296
That seems to be a change - it had long been the convention that footage (including audio) of a public place or taken from a public place were okay - as any passing person could have seen/heard what was going on anyway; while filming/recording your neighbours in their back garden, that cannot be seen from a public place, was not on.
But in this case the person in the public area would have to have brought a step ladder to get to the height of the shed cam pointing at the neighbour. It was clearly an excessively intrusive setup, the neighbour stated they felt it was excessive and Mr Cctv said quite a few were dummies when they weren't. THR outcome isn't surprising and isn't really to do with Ring doorbells!
Yup, no justification for recording private conversations, private or public. It was the right decision in court.
I mean technically they're all breaking planning laws anyway as last time I checked, cctv has to be at greater than 2.5m height.
However I still think this is nonsense, if you want a conversation to be private, go somewhere private.
28 minutes and 9 seconds into this video, you can hear a lot more about the details of the case and why it wasn't just having a camera that was
the issue...
https://youtu.be/1MAx8R4BIYg
quote:
Originally posted by coyoteboy
I mean technically they're all breaking planning laws anyway as last time I checked, cctv has to be at greater than 2.5m height.
However I still think this is nonsense, if you want a conversation to be private, go somewhere private.