4 ms·
Doing that would be very much illegal in Germany. Isn’t it in the US?
by ugh 16y ago
Doing that would be very much illegal in Germany. Isn’t it in the US?
- grav1tas 16y agoWhich part? I don't think he actually logged in under the guy's Facebook account?
- tyhjmhytgfv 16y agoVideo recording somebody in the privacy of their home and broadcasting it without their permission or knowledge.
- masklinn 16y agoAs far as I can tell the guy recorded himself and the data was automatically uploaded from Mark's stolen laptop to his online backup, though Mark is indeed guilty of broadcasting it.
- scotty79 16y agoSo generally you can plant a hidden camera operated remotely in some attractive item, like a laptop (hey! there's already one!), wait for the victim to take the bait ("steal" your laptop) and after that you can record whatever you wish without anyone pressing against you any wiretapping charges? Even camera don't have to be started remotely. Hey, my camera is always rolling and sending stream to remote server. That's my laptop and that's how I'm using it.
- chris_j 16y agoThat's not what happened in this case, of course. The laptop thief used the stolen laptop to film himself but was unaware that the video could be viewed by the laptop's owner. I'm having trouble coming up with an analogy for that one.
- scotty79 16y agoI wasn't drawing any analogy. I just wondered if this kind of invigilation is legal. I know thief started the camera and I'm not acusing Mark of planting laptop or wiretapping. I'm just curious if it's legal to spy on people using the scenario I described.
- masklinn 16y agoErm... You might have missed the part where the perp recorded himself. There was no remote activation, there was no spying, there was no nothing. The perp recorded himself, and two month later as Mark was checking his backups he realized the stolen machine was still backuping itself.
- gacek 16y agoThe recording was done by the thief himself. I guess distributing someones video could be a copyright violation, but wouldn't be criminal. However activating camera/microphone remotely might be considered a wiretap. Another thought: suppose the thief sold the laptop immediately, and the person recorded is guilty of buying a used laptop.
- tyhjmhytgfv 16y agoSorry I thought the owner remotely started the video camera - but accessing the recording remotely could still be considered wiretapping
- zecho 16y agoEven if Mark had remotely turned on the camera of his own computer and started recording, I doubt wiretapping laws could come into play, because it's a) his property (see also: case law involving video recording of employees) and b) he's not law enforcement. What it would come down to is reasonable expectation of privacy, but considering the admission that the laptop was stolen, most judges would throw this whole thing out if privacy was the legal argument. Any thief would know that a person whose property was stolen would probably go looking for it. Mark's first amendment rights to publish data that is recorded on his property trumps the alleged thief's expectation of privacy. The other issue that could come into play is copyright, but again, Mark is the owner of the property. Photographers who shoot photos on company equipment don't have the copyright of those photos; the publisher does, unless there is a specific contract between the author and the publisher granting the publisher (or the author) reproduction licenses. Lastly, others have mentioned libel/slander. There's one flaw in this argument: Nowhere in the video description does it a) explicitly accuse the person of being the thief (so if he was found not guilty, the accused has no case there) and do so with malice or b) even make fun of the guy's dancing (which is a statement of opinion and wouldn't hold up in court).
- oihujyfgthyjuik 16y agoWasn't there a case in the US where schools loaned children laptops and the administrator secretly videotaped the children in their bedrooms and reported them fro some activity? I assume that this was illegal even though the laptop was the school's property
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- fbailey 16y agodifficult question the guy is practically storing his data on Mark`s harddisk- I'm not actually sure that it would be illegal here in Germany to publish the stuff.
- ugh 16y agoThat’s irrelevant. The thief might well not be able to force the victim to delete all the things he stored on the victim’s drive but publishing it is something completely different. Just as an example, if you take a photo of me with your camera and I explicitly tell you to not publish the photo you are not allowed to [0], even if the photo is stored on your own drive. I can’t force you to delete the photo, you are free to keep it and show it to your friends but you are definitely not allowed to publish it. [0] There are certain narrow exceptions in the respective German law but they don’t apply in this case.
- mileszs 16y agoThis is not the case in the US. See: Paparazzi pictures of just about any celebrity ever.
- ams6110 16y agoThere is a different standard for celebrities in the US, probably everywhere.
- lancewiggs 16y agoYes - they fall under "public figure" clauses, and lose a lot of their right to privacy.
- yellowbkpk 16y agoYou're telling me that if you take my camera out of my back pocket while I'm not looking, take a picture of yourself with it, then give it back to me, I am not allowed to publish that picture? Under what law would you sue? In the US you may have a claim under a libel law or similar, but it would be hard to convince a jury or judge that I was libeling you with a picture you took with stolen property.
- scott_s 16y agoEven if it was by the letter of the law, it wouldn't be by the application of the law. What's on the books is not what matters in practice. You need a prosecutor willing to press charges. Considering the circumstances, I doubt a prosecutor would press charges. Of course, the thief could always sue, but even that's a hard sell.
- ugh 16y agoWhy would the thief suing be a hard sell? If it’s really becoming a problem for him paying a lawyer some money to file the necessary paperwork would be no problem.
- scott_s 16y agoIt would be a hard sell to a judge or jury. A prospective lawyer will know this, and may not want to sink time (and/or money) into it. You can sue someone for just about anything, but that doesn't mean you'll win.
- ugh 16y agoBut why? That would never be the case in Germany. A personality rights violation is a personality rights violation. A thief doesn’t lose those rights just because he is a thief. I cannot for the life of me imagine that the US judiciary is that unprofessional.
- scott_s 16y agoFirst, I don't think there was any violation of this person's rights by US law. Second, judges and juries are people, not automatons that blindly apply law. Considering the circumstances, I have a hard time believing a judge or a jury would think that the thief deserves a monetary reward.
- ugh 16y agoNah, not a monetary reward, just getting the video taken down. I don’t think the thief would get some sort of monetary reward in Germany, either.
- rmc 16y agoIt's definitly illegal in Germany and the USA to steal a laptop. If the thief presses privacy charges, the police will probably press theft charges.