4 ms·

I think EU countries are supposed to be using the same legal privacy framework, although the exact way the laws are phrased and interpreted might differ from co

I think EU countries are supposed to be using the same legal privacy framework, although the exact way the laws are phrased and interpreted might differ from country to country. I believe in Spain, generally speaking, it is legal to record your interactions with someone when you are in public. But I think many people are not aware that this is legal, including some police officers, because privacy laws are perceived to be quite strict. Similarly, I think dashcams are actually legal, even though most police probably think they are not. I think these recordings can even be used in court cases, and in fact in many cases it's probably the reason why they are legal, otherwise it would be hard to see a legitimate purpose that would override the privacy drawbacks. However, there are restrictions. Indiscriminate recording (i.e. CCTV) of public areas is illegal, as in Germany. This is also true for the entrances of personal homes: you are only allowed to have CCTV outside if it's pointing directly at your door, not the street in general (and you must post a sign). An obvious restriction is that I think you are not allowed to publish a recording without either anonymizing the people in them or getting their permission. An interesting restriction that comes to mind is that a few years ago, there was a court case of a man who was caught filming children on a school playground while positioned outside the school, which at the time it was presumed to be for sexual purposes, I think because of the way he was doing the recording (big lenses, I think?) and because he didn't have a legitimate motive for doing that (like being the parent of one of the children, or filming a documentary, etc). He was sentenced and received a large fine, but I think the legal reasoning was that children on a school playground are expected to have a legal right to privacy, even though it's a public school. So the judge considered it the legal equivalent of filming someone in their private home from outside. I'm very happy for cases like these where common sense prevails over legal / ideological dogma (even though I'm also aware of the dangers it can pose when laws aren't interpreted to the letter).

someplaceguy 3y ago
> you are only allowed to have CCTV outside if it's pointing directly at your door, not the street in general (and you must post a sign). I forgot to mention that I highly disagree with this restriction. It's really, really bad for home and personal security: pointing the CCTV at your door does absolutely nothing when a robber / kidnapper enters your house while wearing a ski mask. However, pointing the camera outside could much more easily record their identity in the days previous to the crime while they were staking the house (even if they only get caught after the crime), as obviously it's not very feasible to stake a house wearing a ski mask. Or at least, it would deter them much more heavily and possibly prevent a not-insignificant proportion of kidnapping cases, since most of them seem to occur in people's own homes, which seems to be the easiest choice. I am similarly an extremely big critic of self-defense laws in European countries, which basically leave you completely defenseless in your own home even if you or your family are being kidnapped, due to the huge asymmetric advantage that an attacker has over you. Or at the very least, you risk going to jail for many years if anything goes wrong.
- gnatolf 3y ago
  A vast majority of kidnappings are done by family members. It's a movie thing that a ski mask vigilante enters your home to kidnap you. I'm almost 100% positive there's virtually no risk of being kidnapped at home by ski-mask wearing criminals that staked your house previously. Or, if you are in that specific, very small target group for e.g. ransom etc, you probably should've been investing in home security beyond a front door camera anyways.
  - someplaceguy 3y ago
    > Or, if you are in that specific, very small target group for e.g. ransom etc, I am, as are many thousands of other people, in different fields. Although some of my personal circumstances contribute to my risk being especially high, even within these fields. > you probably should've been investing in home security beyond a front door camera anyways. I have, to an extent that has been called unreasonable by multiple "normal" people, and these people are not even aware of 90% of the security measures I've taken, including the best ones. Fortunately, my closest family has always been highly supportive in this endeavor. And these measures are not even half of the recommendations I've been given by security professionals who have scrutinized my life with a fine-toothed comb. Some of these recommendations I've chosen not to take due to not being too adapted to my personal circumstances and lifestyle, but others were amazingly good, far beyond what I expected. That said, the camera issue, gun restrictions, and strict self-defense laws in Europe are huge limitations that all contribute to vastly decreased personal security for me and my family. And I've been advised by experts in this area, so it's not like I'm setting an unreasonably high standard. I'm also generally anti-guns, but alas, in some cases their benefits outweigh their disadvantages (otherwise police wouldn't carry them) and I think gun laws in Europe don't contemplate this type of situation very well. It's also a fallacy to think that there is any single set of measures that will protect you. It's not like you can just hire a bodyguard and suddenly you are safe, in fact this can make things even worse in some circumstances. Physical security can be as much about being careful, having plans in place, keeping a low profile and adding security layers / friction / risk / deterrents as other forms of security such as infosec. In fact, infosec is also a part of physical security nowadays, as well as other similar measures. But of course, you can't just add every possible security measure, either due to cost or friction / unpleasantness. As an example, almost nobody would like to literally live in a bunker, if you know what I mean. Also, don't forget to consider that even when you have great home security, it can be very, very easy to bypass it. Even very famous celebrities with great security teams have been kidnapped in modern times, although many of these cases are unknown to the general public. You'd probably be surprised! And that's only the cases that have been made public, most of them are probably not even made public. Furthermore, your closest family members may not be able to be as vigilant as you, for many different reasons. And it's not even possible to be 100% vigilant all the time, it's extremely easy to get complacent over the years or make mistakes that decrease your security. To add to all that, attackers have a huge asymmetric advantage during an attack, as they have the surprise element.
huganabaga 3y ago
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someplaceguy 3y ago

> you are only allowed to have CCTV outside if it's pointing directly at your door, not the street in general (and you must post a sign). I forgot to mention that I highly disagree with this restriction. It's really, really bad for home and personal security: pointing the CCTV at your door does absolutely nothing when a robber / kidnapper enters your house while wearing a ski mask. However, pointing the camera outside could much more easily record their identity in the days previous to the crime while they were staking the house (even if they only get caught after the crime), as obviously it's not very feasible to stake a house wearing a ski mask. Or at least, it would deter them much more heavily and possibly prevent a not-insignificant proportion of kidnapping cases, since most of them seem to occur in people's own homes, which seems to be the easiest choice. I am similarly an extremely big critic of self-defense laws in European countries, which basically leave you completely defenseless in your own home even if you or your family are being kidnapped, due to the huge asymmetric advantage that an attacker has over you. Or at the very least, you risk going to jail for many years if anything goes wrong.

gnatolf 3y ago
A vast majority of kidnappings are done by family members. It's a movie thing that a ski mask vigilante enters your home to kidnap you. I'm almost 100% positive there's virtually no risk of being kidnapped at home by ski-mask wearing criminals that staked your house previously. Or, if you are in that specific, very small target group for e.g. ransom etc, you probably should've been investing in home security beyond a front door camera anyways.
- someplaceguy 3y ago
  > Or, if you are in that specific, very small target group for e.g. ransom etc, I am, as are many thousands of other people, in different fields. Although some of my personal circumstances contribute to my risk being especially high, even within these fields. > you probably should've been investing in home security beyond a front door camera anyways. I have, to an extent that has been called unreasonable by multiple "normal" people, and these people are not even aware of 90% of the security measures I've taken, including the best ones. Fortunately, my closest family has always been highly supportive in this endeavor. And these measures are not even half of the recommendations I've been given by security professionals who have scrutinized my life with a fine-toothed comb. Some of these recommendations I've chosen not to take due to not being too adapted to my personal circumstances and lifestyle, but others were amazingly good, far beyond what I expected. That said, the camera issue, gun restrictions, and strict self-defense laws in Europe are huge limitations that all contribute to vastly decreased personal security for me and my family. And I've been advised by experts in this area, so it's not like I'm setting an unreasonably high standard. I'm also generally anti-guns, but alas, in some cases their benefits outweigh their disadvantages (otherwise police wouldn't carry them) and I think gun laws in Europe don't contemplate this type of situation very well. It's also a fallacy to think that there is any single set of measures that will protect you. It's not like you can just hire a bodyguard and suddenly you are safe, in fact this can make things even worse in some circumstances. Physical security can be as much about being careful, having plans in place, keeping a low profile and adding security layers / friction / risk / deterrents as other forms of security such as infosec. In fact, infosec is also a part of physical security nowadays, as well as other similar measures. But of course, you can't just add every possible security measure, either due to cost or friction / unpleasantness. As an example, almost nobody would like to literally live in a bunker, if you know what I mean. Also, don't forget to consider that even when you have great home security, it can be very, very easy to bypass it. Even very famous celebrities with great security teams have been kidnapped in modern times, although many of these cases are unknown to the general public. You'd probably be surprised! And that's only the cases that have been made public, most of them are probably not even made public. Furthermore, your closest family members may not be able to be as vigilant as you, for many different reasons. And it's not even possible to be 100% vigilant all the time, it's extremely easy to get complacent over the years or make mistakes that decrease your security. To add to all that, attackers have a huge asymmetric advantage during an attack, as they have the surprise element.

huganabaga 3y ago

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