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Court OKs Covert iPhone Audio Recording
Tootech writes "Using an iPhone to secretly record a conversation is not a violation of the Wiretap Act if done for legitimate purposes, a federal appeals court has ruled. 'The defendant must have the intent to use the illicit recording to commit a tort of crime beyond the act of recording itself,' the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled. Friday's decision, which involves a civil lawsuit over a secret audio recording produced from the 99-cent Recorder app, mirrors decisions in at least three other federal appeals courts."
It doesn't break Federal law, but it may be against state law. Recording someone without their consent is a felony in Illinois, and probably other states as well.
Free Martian Whores!
There are twelve 2-party states out there, and some of them are big ones like California and Florida. And calling a two-party state from a one-party state does mean you need to follow the laws of both states.
Check your local rules before you start recording.
The ______ Agenda
I admin a phone system in Idaho, a one party consent state. Basically, we can record anything without warning, even calls from two-party consent states.
What doesn't kill you only delays the inevitable
I admin phone systems in several states, including both 1 and 2 party states, and I hate to tell you this but you're breaking the law. You're not breaking Ohio law, but you're breaking the laws in the 2 party states. You could technically be extradited, but it's unlikely. However, do you really want a bench warrant issued against you in each of a dozen states?
It's never been illegal to record police in public. That hasn't stopped certain corrupt police departments and district attorneys from persecuting people who do so, of course, but they've used twisted logic, not actual law, to make their cases. Radley Balko at Reason has done a number of excellent exposes on this problem.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
He said calls from two party states not calls to two party states.
The tyrant will always find a pretext for his tyranny - Aesop
Hell, does this pave the way to just simply record everyone in public, all of the the time, and just say you no longer have any real expectation of privacy anymore?
If you are IN PUBLIC you already have zero expectation of privacy, the SCOTUS has confirmed this previously, not sure why you are surprised...
Why is it important that the recording was performed with this particular device?
It isn't. It's a WIRED-vertisement, and now a slashvertisement as well.
Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder.
Absolutely false - they need to extradite you first, THEN you have a trial. Not going to happen too often. So if you're in a one-party jurisdiction, record away, now that federal law outweighs the 2-party state laws for inter-state communications.
Strange.
I had a Panasonic over 15 years ago and it could record calls. It was basic and could only record for a number of seconds. I guess now it was for recording spoken addresses and phone numbers. I never used it.
My last Sony could record calls. This was 4 or 5 years ago. Horrible Sony proprietary audio file. I never used it.
My current Samsung, that's a couple of years old, can record calls. A nice mp3, on the memory card, as you'd expect. I've never used it
I've never owned a Nokia, but I guess they record calls too..?
Stop buying phones in the US, I'd say.
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