What are an amateur photographer&#39;s rights at a protest/riot? Suppose an amateur photographer, i.e. does not get paid for her work and has no press credentials. The photographer does post photos to social media, e.g. instagram. The photographer attends the rally in Washington D.C on January 6 for photography purposes only. The photographer is wearing neutral clothing, has a camera bag over her shoulder, and a DSLR camera with a large lens. The photographer starts with the crowd at the White House and follows the crowd to the Senate building and even into the building itself, all the while taking photos. Is the photographer guilty of a crime at any point? Are press credentials required as a form of immunity from arrest/prosecution?
While at times the Capitol building is open to the public, as the answer by hszmv mentions, at other times it is not, particularly when &quot;an event designated as a special event of national significance&quot; is in progress. Breaking open a door or window, or entering through a door or window that someone else has broken open, could not be thought of by a reasonable person as a legitimate entry. During any period when the Capitol Police were admitting people, those people were allowed to enter, but the question speaks of one who &quot;follows the crowd to the Senate building and even into the building itself&quot; which sounds like one who entered via one of the forced openings, although possibly not. In any case my understanding is that the Capitol Police and other security troops made announcements instructing people to leave the building. Once this was done, reaming in the building willingly would have been a violation of law. That a person was holding a camera, or indeed had press credentials, would not be a defense to such a charge, although it might be seen as a mitigating factor. In general Press credentials do not give a person greater rights of access anywhere. In recent years with the rise of armature or semi-pro journalism via the net, courts have been more careful to treat uninvolved citizens as potential journalists. In addition to ordinary trespassing charges, 18 U.S. Code § 1752 - Restricted building or grounds is applicable, and according to news reports has been used to charge various people who were filmed in the Capitol. 18 USC § 1752 imposes penalties on anyone who: (a)(1) knowingly enters or remains in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority to do so; (a)(2) knowingly, and with intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions, engages in disorderly or disruptive conduct in, or within such proximity to, any restricted building or grounds when, or so that, such conduct, in fact, impedes or disrupts the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions (a)(3) knowingly, and with the intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions, obstructs or impedes ingress or egress to or from any restricted building or grounds (a)(4) knowingly engages in any act of physical violence against any person or property in any restricted building or grounds (a)(5) knowingly and willfully operates an unmanned aircraft system with the intent to knowingly and willfully direct or otherwise cause such unmanned aircraft system to enter or operate within or above a restricted building or grounds It would seem that (a)(1) would apply to a person acting as described in the question, or at least it might. Several of the other sections would apply to at least some of the intruders, but not to an amateur photographer as described in the question. A &quot;restricted building&quot; is defined by 18 USC § 1752 as: (c) (1) the term “restricted buildings or grounds” means any posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area— ... (c) (1) (B) of a building or grounds where the President or other person protected by the Secret Service is or will be temporarily visiting; or (c) (1) (C) of a building or grounds so restricted in conjunction with an event designated as a special event of national significance This would seem to apply to most, if not all of the Capitol Building during the counting of Electoral votes, due to the presence of the Vice President, particularly to any area behind locked doors or to any area at all once police had instructed people to leave. Possible penalties under 18 USC § 1752 include a fine and up to 1 year of imprisonment, or up to 10 years for anyone who &quot;uses or carries a deadly or dangerous weapon or firearm&quot; or whose offense &quot;results in significant bodily injury&quot;. A person acting as described in the the question would presumably not have either aggravating factor apply.
Yes, that might be a violation of data protection law such as the DPA 2018 / UKGDPR, but not necessarily so. It depends on the details, for example on the purpose this camera serves. Background on Fairhurst v Woodard and on legitimate interests Fairhurst v Woodard is a significant case discussing implications of use of video surveillance outside of a commercial context, but it is a complex case due to the multitude of cameras involved and due to the somewhat unrelated privacy and harassment issues. Point 135 is about the Driveway Camera, which only surveilled public property and the claimant's property, but did not view any part of the defendants property. People are free to surveil their own property, and would then be covered by the UKGDPR household exception. But for surveillance outside of their own property, defendant would have to comply with the DPA 2018 and the UKGDPR, for which defendant would have needed a legal basis. The defendant argued that they had a legitimate interest (Art 6(1)(f) UKGDPR): 134. […] The Defendant submits that all his data collection and processing was necessary for the purposes of crime prevention at his property and in the car park However, a legitimate interest always require as balancing test. The legitimate interest can be “overridden by the interests or fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject” (Art 6(1)(f) UKGDPR). It is not necessary here that these interests, rights, and freedoms are explicitly enumerated in statutory law. Here, a right is claimed without supporting legal basis: 134. […] Claimant submits that her right to privacy in and around her home overrides that purpose. However, a possible basis for this claim would be Art 8(1) of the European Convention on Human Rights, which is part of UK constitutional law: “Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.” The court balances these rights and interests very differently for the different cameras. The Ring Doorbell is mainly focused on people who would ring the defendant's doorbell, and only incidentally captures passer-bys. Here, the legitimate interest was found to be valid. On the other hand, the Driveway Camera was mostly trained on claimant's property. Here, claimant's interests, rights, and freedoms override the claimed legitimate interests. Your scenario If the camera records the people living in the Green House when they go to or from their property, then yes, it seems like their rights would be affected. But in your scenario, the context of the camera is not clear: Why was it installed? If the purpose is crime prevention, is there evidence of such crimes in the neighbourhood, or are the cameras intended to counter a speculative threat? What is its field of view? Is it mainly trained on the Yellow House's doorstep and only captures the street as a background, or does it focus on the street? Is the camera's field of view masked off as far as possible to exclude public spaces? Does the camera record continuously, or is it only activated for certain events like when a doorbell is rung or when someone enters the Yellow House property? Does the camera also record audio? All of this is important because it factors into a legitimate interest balancing test. Maybe the Yellow House camera is more like the Ring Doorbell in the above case where the incidental capture of passer-bys was found to be acceptable, maybe it is more like the Driveway Camera that served no legitimate interest. There is no absolute right to be free of all surveillance. Instead, the interests and rights of the Green and Yellow house residents must be balanced appropriately. Where there is surveillance, it must be limited to what is necessary.
(Assuming the jurisdiction is the US.) Your question I was wondering whether there are any limitations on using photos of private individuals on websites. is the least of your potential problems. Photos of the public taken in public are mostly legal to use and publish, and you own the copyright on the photo, and generally don't need a model release. But your plan of posting the photo with accompanying information about (alleged) fraud: There's a fraud conducting business in my state and I want to create a website that warns others of his fraudulent practices. is potentially legally problematic. As phoog indicates in his comment, you need to be aware of defamation, both at the federal level and among states, as some have criminalized defamation (Wikipedia). Libel is the publication of provably false facts by one person about another person. For a full outline of defamation (libel and slander, and including private and public figures), see Libel and Slander | Nolo.com. What you want to do is publish "facts" about this alleged fraud on the website with a photo of the individual, linking the fraud allegations to them. That is potentially libelous. The facts of the fraud may be provably true, or they may be provably false; that remains to be seen. But the facts don't matter when considering what actions the person can take against you if you publish such information on your website. If this business and the individual(s) feel they are not committing fraud, they can sue you for libel in civil court, alleging that you have damaged their reputation and impacted their business by publishing those facts on your website with the photo identifying the person and their business. If they take legal action, and you can prove the business and the individual(s) are committing fraud with provable facts - hard evidence of fraud, such as legal documents and court judgments - than you should (no guarantees) be able to successfully defend yourself in a libel suit brought against you by that person. Even if the business and the individual(s) are aware of facts that prove their fraud, and know they will probably not prevail in court, they can still take you to court, and it will cost you whatever time and money it takes to defend yourself. My responses above concern what legal actions the alleged could take against you if you published the website with the photo and information about the alleged fraud. No one here is advising you to put up the website with the photo and the "facts" as you see them, even if you have hard proof of the facts of the fraud; you should find legal representation before taking any action with the website. And, no one here is advising you to open any legal action against the person; that's your choice in terms of determining your case and if you can show actual harm that was caused by the alleged fraud by the individual, and you should find legal representation before taking any action.
TSA states TSA does not prohibit photographing, videotaping or filming at security checkpoints, as long as the screening process is not interfered with or sensitive information is not revealed. Interference with screening includes but is not limited to holding a recording device up to the face of a TSA officer so that the officer is unable to see or move, refusing to assume the proper stance during screening, blocking the movement of others through the checkpoint or refusing to submit a recording device for screening. Additionally, you may not film or take pictures of equipment monitors that are shielded from public view. Since it is not forbidden, the law doesn't directly say anything: your right to photograph and the absence of any prohibition from the 1st Amendment. So they may not punish you at all for photographing them.
Facebook can continue to gather and exploit data, modulo the requirements of COPPA, because it does not depend on obligating a minor to do something, such as pay money or dig a ditch. In general and because of copyright law, nobody has the right to use anything that Facebook provides unless Facebook grants the user permission. The user has no obligation to provide anything to Facebook – if it did, the minor would arguably be exempt from that obligation.
You might be able to use a site like the Internet Archive to preserve the TOC even after the site is shut down. The real liability trap here is if the site does not have the authority to give you this license. If a user uploads a photo that they do not own, and you use it, you are infringing the copyright of the original owner. Innocent infringement is not a defense to liability (although it may reduce damages in some cases.)
can you hire a witness as your lawyer to exclude their testimony? That is pure fiction and misleading. Unfortunately scenes like that contribute to keep people ignorant about the law, which then makes it easier for courts to dissimulate their recurrent miscarriage of justice. But Purdue University v. Wartell, 5 N.E.3d 797 (2014) is an example where the Indiana courts did the right thing, and is pertinent to your question. There, Purdue University first assigned an investigator in regard to plaintiff's grievance, and thereafter the University tried to withhold information under pretext that the investigator was also its lawyer and thus that the information was protected by the privilege. Because that person hitherto had been portrayed only as an independent investigator, the Indiana courts concluded that Purdue University was estopped from invoking the attorney-client privilege (as well as the work-product doctrine). Thus, the guy in the film or series who said to be "screwed on Kardashian" reflects pure cluelessness about how the law supposedly operates. I have not seen the plot of that film or series, but the information that the friend-lawyer obtained prior to becoming O.J.'s attorney would not be protected by the privilege because it was not obtained in preparation for O.J.'s defense. If there were one star witness on the opposing side and they happened to be a lawyer, could you simply pay them off by hiring them as your lawyer? This question is somewhat unclear to me, but I will mention that lawyers have a duty to disclose to their potential or actual client any conflict of interests. The rules of so-called "professional conduct" discourage lawyers to ignore conflict of interests in that this conflict may impair their "services". And, as I explained previously, any information that a lawyer obtains as witness rather than as attorney in the matter is not protected by the privilege. Thus, as for If you committed a crime at a law-firm and everyone who witnessed it was a lawyer, is there any rule preventing you from just hiring all of them? the answer is: Nothing prevents the criminal from hiring all of them, but that information is not protected.
PIPA has a dispute resolution process. See page 39 of the guidance document. The judge in your current case may have the power to award you damages under PIPA, but most likely not. You are probably best served by using the information as evidence that the guy is a bad person, has little regard for the laws, openly defied PIPA, etc. However, if he's smart he will say that you consented. Look at pages 5 and 6 of that document that you linked to. Unless you protested when you handed him your license and watched him photograph it, it's hard for you to say that you did not provide implied or verbal consent. This is especially true when coupled with the PIPA dispute resolution which start with you attempting to resolve this issue before filing a complaint. In summary, it might help you demonstrate a pattern of bad behavior but your current legal dispute is not the place to resolve your privacy issue.