376
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 24 Jan 2026
376 points (99.7% liked)
World News
54120 readers
2982 users here now
A community for discussing events around the World
Rules:
-
Rule 1: posts have the following requirements:
- Post news articles only
- Video links are NOT articles and will be removed.
- Title must match the article headline
- Not United States Internal News
- Recent (Past 30 Days)
- Screenshots/links to other social media sites (Twitter/X/Facebook/Youtube/reddit, etc.) are explicitly forbidden, as are link shorteners.
-
Rule 2: Do not copy the entire article into your post. The key points in 1-2 paragraphs is allowed (even encouraged!), but large segments of articles posted in the body will result in the post being removed. If you have to stop and think "Is this fair use?", it probably isn't. Archive links, especially the ones created on link submission, are absolutely allowed but those that avoid paywalls are not.
-
Rule 3: Opinions articles, or Articles based on misinformation/propaganda may be removed.
-
Rule 4: Posts or comments that are homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, anti-religious, or ableist will be removed. “Ironic” prejudice is just prejudiced.
-
Posts and comments must abide by the lemmy.world terms of service UPDATED AS OF OCTOBER 19 2025
-
Rule 5: Keep it civil. It's OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It's NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
-
Rule 6: Memes, spam, other low effort posting, reposts, misinformation, advocating violence, off-topic, trolling, offensive, regarding the moderators or meta in content may be removed at any time.
-
Rule 7: We didn't USED to need a rule about how many posts one could make in a day, then someone posted NINETEEN articles in a single day. Not comments, FULL ARTICLES. If you're posting more than say, 10 or so, consider going outside and touching grass. We reserve the right to limit over-posting so a single user does not dominate the front page.
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
Lemmy World Partners
News !news@lemmy.world
Politics !politics@lemmy.world
World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world
Recommendations
For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/
- Consider including the article’s mediabiasfactcheck.com/ link
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
The problem isn't the recording, this was in a public place where there is no expectation of privacy, the problem is covert recording.
Yes, and covert recording by definition is done without the knowledge or consent of the one being recorded. It should be illegal everywhere, but some states have single-party consent laws which allow it.
(imagine applying such a rule to sexual activity, it would be absurd; yet somehow it's totally legal to broadcast a person's name, face, and location to the world without them even knowing what's happening?)
I think knowledge and consent need to be distinguished, there are lots of people who are filmed in public that wouldn't consent to it, bike thieves for instance. I don't think that banning filming or photography in public is a sensible idea.
Do you also support CCTV and flock cameras, then? Because that's the same argument used to justify those.
"Be afraid of crime. Let the authorities spy on you. Now you're protected." What about when the authorities abuse their power? Who's going to protect you then?
(For the record, I believe all public officials should be required to give up some of their expectations of privacy as a condition of working as a public official. The public requires a level of trust in them that it doesn't require of ordinary private citizens. They should have to submit financial statements, and they should also have to declare unconditional consent to be recorded by anyone in any given moment, except in confidential spaces like homes, offices, briefing rooms, etc.)
But the thing is, in order to catch a bike thief on video, you have to already be recording either them or the bike, and since it's nearly impossible to predict, the chances of catching it on camera are slim. Unless you use ubiquitous area cameras pointed at all the bike racks. And even then, if they're casual enough or hide their face then no one would know they're stealing it except the owner of the bike, or no one would be able to identify the person who stole it.
I don't think giving the authorities (or the hive mind, for that matter) unrestricted access to constant recordings of every public space is a sensible idea, because it's too prone to abuse. That's how you get a surveillance state, like the USSR or america right now. They misinterpret a movement of your hand and label you "antifa terrorist" and you get flagged for closer scrutiny, where everything they observe you doing is then run through interpretive filters that are biased towards describing you as a terrorist.
Whoever is analyzing those recordings is going to be paranoid to some degree, or their algorithms are going to hallucinate patterns that aren't there, or someone is going to get vindictive and use the power to abuse anyone they don't like. Do you want every twitch, gesture, or facial expression being labelled and categorized by AI and then saved into a profile of you that some unknown spook can access at any time? Then when you notice plain clothes agents scoping you out, they get a screenshot of your face looking nervous and label it as "definitely guilty," and they close in on you tighter and tighter until either your anxiety takes over and you're labeled as paranoid/psychotic, or they push you into a panic attack and label your conduct "disorderly" and use it as a pretext to make an arrest?
The whole thing is too prone to abuse, and it's not even an effective deterrent for crime prevention. I can't agree with it. Better to build community trust and economic empowerment to address crime from the root causes; that's the only method that's been shown to significantly reduce crime.
Yes CCTV in public is not inherently evil, where it is obvious and not hidden. What I was talking about though was the right of the public to photograph and film in public spaces. Without that right there would be no street photography, no citizen journalism exposing police abuse of power, no youtubers making videos about strange and interesting things in public, no footage of people committing crimes in public, no videos of cats in Istanbul. This (and more) is what would be lost if we ban cameras from public places.
When authorities abuse their power the only protection is evidence and public backlash. The best evidence is video evidence. That's why the police wearing body worn cameras is a good thing, it means the public can hold them to account if they misbehave.
There is a big difference between passive CCTV (recordings can be accessed if needed) and active CCTV (continually scanned by AI combined with facial recognition). I do think that unless there is serious pushback against facial recognition it will be increasingly implemented, despite the risks, however your worries about the police scanning your facial expression and sending plain clothes officers after you are completely unfounded and a little bit unhinged.
https://sopuli.xyz/post/40232627
One thing I've learned is that if it can be abused, the authorities will abuse it unless laws are passed to stop them. And even then they'll try to change the laws or abuse it secretly.
You're no longer arguing against my point, which is that filming and photography in public with single party consent is important.
My point is that it presents more potential for harm than potential for good.
If single party consent is totally fine, then what's the issue with the original post in question?
That's where I made the distinction in my original comment between consent and knowledge. In the scenario in the article the woman being filmed had no knowledge that she was being filmed and was therefore unable to provide informed consent to the interaction. If she had known that she was being filmed, she could have walked away, or altered the way in which she approached the interaction. In the videos that I linked in my other comment everyone on camera knew that they were being recorded and were therefore able to decide if they wanted to consent to the interaction. Apart from possibly the cat.
In one of my earlier comments, I said:
In other words, I already distinguished between knowledge and consent because if I thought they were the same thing then it would have been redundant to mention both.
Anyway, you seem to be contradicting yourself. You're basically saying you shouldn't need someone's consent to film them in public, but you can't film them without they're knowledge because it would mean you don't have their informed consent? So you don't need their consent, but you do?
Or are you just using this logical inconsistency to justify it when it doesn't inconvenience anyone you care about, while still reserving enough room to condemn it when it inconveniences someone you do?
Single-party consent laws do not require the persons being recorded to have knowledge they're being recorded. Hence, my criticism was of normalizing covert recording.
Adding a caveat that you don't need consent to record someone, but you do need to inform them that they're being recorded, doesn't make any sense. Someone could stick a camera in your face and follow you around as long as they say "You're being recorded." People can't just "walk away" under those circumstances, short of avoiding ever going out in public.
Also, saying she could have "altered the way in which she approached the interaction" sounds a lot like victim blaming. Just because someone doesn't effectively respond to a situation does not imply they consent to it.
I see where you're coming from and will do my best to clarify my position. I am going to distinguish between Explicit and Tacit consent, and Explicit and Assumed Knowledge. The reason I distinguish between Explicit Knowledge and Explicit Consent is that you can combine them in different ways:
Yes Explicit Knowledge Yes Explicit Consent (interview)
Yes Explicit Knowledge No Explicit Consent (bike thief being filmed)
No Explicit Knowledge No Explicit Consent (Covert filming)
In order to give Explicit Consent to being filmed you must first have Knowledge of being filmed. This might be someone who agrees to be interviewed on camera.
The bike thief didn't give Explicit Consent to be filmed, but did have Knowledge of being filmed. If they didn't want to be filmed they could do something about it, such as leave the area, or confront the person filming. Because they didn't take action to prevent themselves from being filmed despite knowing that it was happening, they gave Tacit Consent.
You say that by this measure:
No, that's called harassment and is a separate offence.
The woman being covertly filmed doesn't have the Explicit Knowledge that she is being filmed and so cannot give Explicit Consent. She is also unable to take any specific action against being recorded because she unaware that it is happening: the filming is covert. (You misread my previous comment, I was saying she could have done something if she had known).
Here's the catch: this is all happening in public, and there is no expectation of privacy in public. This is where Assumed Knowledge comes in. When you are in public you must Assume that you may be recorded. It may be by someone taking a selfie, or filming ducks in the park, you may never see them. This isn't Covert, because you Know it may be happening (and if you see people filming or taking photos you can then deny Tacit Consent by not walking into their photo).