Recording Conversations And Phone Calls - A Quick Primer

by Gary L. Wickert

One-Party Consent

If the consent of one party is required, you can record a conversation if you’re a party to the conversation. If you’re not a party to the conversation, you can record a conversation or phone call provided one party consents to it after having full knowledge and notice that the conversation will be recorded...

All-Party Consent

Twelve (12) states require the consent of everybody involved in a conversation or phone call before the conversation can be recorded. Those states are: California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Washington. These laws are sometimes referred to as “Two-Party” consent laws but, technically, require that all parties to a conversation must give consent before the conversation can be recorded.

Consent

What constitutes “consent” is also an issue of contention when you are considering recording a conversation. In some states, “consent” is given if the parties to the call are clearly notified that the conversation will be recorded, and they engage in the conversation anyway. Their consent is implied. For example, we have all experienced calling a customer service department only to hear a recorded voice warning, “This call may be recorded for quality assurance or training purposes.” It is usually a good practice for practitioners to let the witness know they are recording the call in order to accurately recall and commemorate the testimony being given – such as during the taking of a witness’ statement.

Exceptions

Nearly all states include an extensive list of exceptions to their consent requirements. Common exceptions found in a majority of states’ laws include recordings captured by police, court order, communication service providers, emergency services, etc... 

Interstate/Multi-State Phone Calls

Telephone calls are routinely originated in one state and participated in by residents of another state. In conference call settings, multiple states (and even countries) could be participating in a telephone call which is subject to being recorded by one or more parties to the call. This presents some rather challenging legal scenarios when trying to evaluate whether a call may legally be recorded. A call from Pennsylvania to a person in New York involves the laws of both states. Which state’s laws apply and/or whether the law of each state must be adhered to are questions parties to a call are routinely faced with...

Federal Law

In most cases, both state and federal laws may apply. State laws are enforced by your local police department and the state’s attorney office. Federal wiretapping laws are enforced by the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s office. It is a federal crime to wiretap or to use a machine to capture the communications of others without court approval, unless one of the parties has given their prior consent. This means that if you are initiating a recording on a call that you are participating in, the other party does not need to be notified that the call is being recorded. It is likewise a federal crime to use or disclose any information acquired by illegal wiretapping or electronic eavesdropping. more

More information on the laws in all 50 states regarding the recording of phone conversations found here.

Don't Own the Trade Secret But Still Want to Sue for Misappropriation?

You may be able to bring a misappropriation of trade secrets claim even if you do not actually own the misappropriated trade secret. A growing number of federal cases indicate ownership of a trade secret may not be required in order for a plaintiff to sue for misappropriation; possession alone may be enough to confer standing.

In Advanced Fluid Systems, Inc. v. Huber, the Third Circuit affirmed a district court ruling holding that a plaintiff suing for misappropriation under the Pennsylvania Uniform Trade Secrets Act (“PUTSA”) need only demonstrate lawful possession of the trade secret at issue, and not legal ownership, to maintain a claim. There, Advanced Fluid Systems (“AFS”), a designer and installer of hydraulic systems, filed suit against defendants alleging they had conspired to misappropriate AFS trade secret information to divert business to a competitor.  

In a twenty-six page opinion, the Court concluded that fee simple ownership of a trade secret is not a prerequisite to recover for its misappropriation. more

FutureWatch – The Eyes Have IT

One of the more interesting aspects of Technical Surveillance Countermeasures (TSCM), or sweeping for bugs, is looking into the future. Seemingly an exercise in entertainment at first glance, looking forward has a serious purpose—staying ahead of the bad guys, not one step behind (as some TSCM’ers seem to be proud to say). Smart contact lens technology caught my eye for this episode of FutureWatch.

Taking a look at “future vision” we see… more

While we don’t have smart contact lenses yet, we do have X-ray vision.

FutureWatch - Super Microphones Coming to Eavesdropping Devices and...

... more mundane items like smart speakers and cell phones...  

 A KAIST research team ... has developed a bioinspired flexible piezoelectric acoustic sensor with multi-resonant ultrathin piezoelectric membrane mimicking the basilar membrane of the human cochlea. The flexible acoustic sensor has been miniaturized ... is ready for accurate and far-distant voice detection. more

CCTV Company Pays Remote Workers to Yell at Armed Robbers

Clerks at 7-Eleven and other convenience stores are being constantly monitored by a voice of god that can intervene from thousands of miles away.

In a short CCTV video, a clerk at a small convenience store can be seen taking a bottle of coffee from a cooler and drinking it. When he returns to the cash register, an unseen person's voice emits from a speaker on the ceiling and interrogates him about whether he scanned and paid for the item.

In another video, a cashier is standing behind the counter talking to someone just out of frame. There’s a 'ding' sound, and the voice from above questions the cashier about who the other man is—he’s there to give the cashier a ride at the end of his shift—then orders the man to stand on the other side of the counter.

The videos are just a few examples that Washington-based Live Eye Surveillance uses to demonstrate its flagship product: a surveillance camera system that keeps constant watch over shops and lets a remote human operator intervene whenever they see something they deem suspicious.  

For enough money—$399 per month according to one sales email Motherboard viewed—a person in Karnal, India will watch the video feed from your business 24/7. The monitors “act as a virtual supervisor for the sites, in terms of assuring the safety of the employees located overseas and requesting them to complete assigned tasks,” according to a job posting on the company's website. more

Security Director Alert: Millions of Connected Cameras Open to Eavesdropping

A supply-chain component lays open camera feeds to remote attackers thanks to a critical security vulnerability.  

Millions of connected security and home cameras contain a critical software vulnerability that can allow remote attackers to tap into video feeds, according to a warning from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).

The bug (CVE-2021-32934, with a CVSS v3 base score of 9.1) has been introduced via a supply-chain component from ThroughTek that’s used by several original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) of security cameras – along with makers of IoT devices like baby- and pet-monitoring cameras, and robotic and battery devices. 

The potential issues stemming from unauthorized viewing of feeds from these devices are myriad.

For critical infrastructure operators and enterprises:

• video-feed interceptions could reveal sensitive business data,
• production/competitive secrets,
• information on floorplans for use in physical attacks,
• and employee information.

And for home users, the privacy implications are obvious. more

A Month of Spycam News

IN - A former Indiana police officer awaiting sentencing for recording young girls in a bathroom died by suicide Monday. more

Ireland - Devout Christian busted for filming men and boys using toilet and setting up secret cameras in B&B more

FL - A Florida youth pastor who was previously accused of hiding a camera in a church bathroom has now been charged with possession of child pornography. more

Canada - A Cold Lake high school teacher was charged by RCMP with making child pornography and voyeurism. Assumption teacher James Neil Morrison allegedly installed a camera in a student changeroom and recorded inappropriate imagery of a 16-year-old. more

FL - Robert Sampson, 52, of Gulf Breeze, Florida, pled guilty today to charges of Video Voyeurism and Disorderly Conduct. Sampson surreptitiously videoed eight fellow Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) employees using a hidden recording device that he placed in a restroom at the Veterans Affairs Joint Ambulatory Care Center in Pensacola, Florida, on multiple occasions. more

PA - A Pennsylvania florist has been accused of hiding a small camera in a flower arrangement so that he could spy on a woman. According to local reports, this was learned after a relative of the victim found nude images downloaded on the florist’s computer. more

Japan - Police in Tokyo have arrested a 33-year-old elementary school teacher on suspicion of violating the child pornography law and forcible obstruction of business after he allegedly installed a spy camera inside the girl’s toilet. more

UK - A man has been charged with voyeurism offences involving 107 alleged victims over a period of six years. David Glover, 47, of Edelweiss View in Tallington, is accused of installing camera equipment to observe women doing a private act, without their consent, for his own sexual gratification. more

FL - A bartender in Islamorada was arrested after reportedly placing a video camera that captured photos of a woman in a bathroom... The device was disguised as a USB charging adapter, according to deputies. more

Canada - A former maintenance worker at Royal Oaks Country Club who hid a cellphone in a restroom to secretly record a woman using the toilet was sentenced Monday to 30 days on a work crew. more 

CT - A city man accused of recording guests in his Glenbrook condo while they used the bathroom has pleaded guilty to multiple counts of voyeurism. more 

SC - Riviere is named as a defendant in three separate lawsuits in state court that accuse the management of some Aiken short-term rental properties of secretly recording women who paid to stay there. more 

US - A man has claimed he caught his girlfriend of six years cheating on him by using a hidden spy camera secreted away inside a USB plug that he left in their apartment. The anonymous man, from the US, went viral on TikTok earlier this week after he revealed he had bought a plug-in USB brick, which contained secret spyware... The video, which has been hashtagged #CheatersGettingCaught, has been viewed over 2.5million times and amassed over 432,000 likes. more 

LA - Monroe man arrested on four counts of video voyeurism... The victim then stated she found a video of herself getting in and out of the shower at his residence. Fairly stated that he ordered a clock with a hidden camera on Ebay to record the inside of his house. more

CO - Denver Firefighter Paid $100K over Station Bedroom Spycam. The settlement comes after a former lieutenant was convicted last year in connection with setting up a hidden camera and recording a female firefighter changing clothes. more

S. Korea - There has been a public outcry over a recent case in which a male teacher allegedly installed hidden cameras in a restroom for female teachers at the high school where he works. more

New Zealand - A man who repeatedly planted a spy camera in an Auckland gym's changing rooms to film people naked was promoted to chief executive of Crown entity International Accreditation New Zealand (IANZ) after the offending took place. more 

TN - A former high school nurse has been arrested on child pornography charges for photographing over 40 girl students undressing in the bathroom... The seized photos were all captured through a hidden camera placed in a school bathroom. more  

Japan - A staff member at a social welfare facility in the prefecture resigned after he was accused of illicit filming inside a bathroom, the facility revealed on Monday. The camera, which was hidden inside a pen... “I did it for thrills,” the staff member said in admitting to the allegations. more

UK - Judge James Burbidge QC, sentencing, described how the defendant had hidden a spy camera in an air freshener and had used it to take more than 10,500 photographs. more

You don't have to become a victim. Learn how to detect spy cameras.

Concerns Increase As Business Espionage Escallates

Business espionage has become more common in recent times due to the growth of outsourcing. Outsourcing work reduces the amount of direct contact between workers and employers, yet increases the potential for conflict and theft. An increase in business Espionage is therefore of major concern...

Companies must take steps to protect their intellectual property from employees who may be tempted to use this information to gain an unfair advantage ... The longer Espionage goes on the more the company will pay for it in terms of lost revenue. more

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Companies—large and small—need to be aware of espionage threats. If that seems a bit overboard, consider the dramatic increase in the number of incidents related to geopolitical cybercrime. 

"Many authoritarian governments are doing everything they can, including using their spy services, to build successful businesses and grow their economies," explained Bill Priestap and Holden Triplett, co-founders of Trenchcoat Advisors, and adjunct professors at Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service, in their Lawfare Institute article: The Espionage Threat to U.S. Businesses. "These nation-states are consciously building national champions to dominate industries to extend their national power—not just domestically but also worldwide." 

Priestap and Triplett advise the weapon of choice is espionage, since an average business owner would never suspect that kind of interest. "Intelligence and the art of spying are no longer constrained to the government sphere," mention Priestap and Triplett. "The assets that competitor states are now seeking to obtain from the United States are not possessed by the government—they are possessed by companies." more

Yet Another Spycam in a Smoke Detector Story

Rob Riggle’s divorce from his wife, Tiffany, after 21 years of marriage has taken a dramatic, new turn after the actor accused her of hacking his Apple account, taking $28,000 from his home office, and spying on him with a hidden camera... 

The actor says he began to grow suspicious that he was being watched after he noticed that his estranged wife somehow knew about private conversations he’d had in his home office either with or about his girlfriend and assistant...

In response the actor decided in April to have his home swept for devices that might be spying on him, claiming to have found a camera hidden in one of his smoke detectors. He says the camera had a memory card with more than 10,000 videos stored on it. He believes the camera was installed in August 2020 and had likely been watching him ever since. The actor claims that one of those videos shows Tiffany standing on a ladder installing the spy camera...

Riggle has been granted a temporary restraining order against his ex, and another hearing is set for July regarding his request to have all of the footage obtained from the hidden camera analyzed by a forensic expert. more

Imagination Becomes a Reality... somewhat.

≈1990 - Murray Associates... "Picture this. You’re the Chief of R&D at a mid-sized snack food company. You have just discussed a new project with your staff of fifteen. Top secret. Your company is preparing a new cookie. Encapsulated chocolate bits make noises when bitten. From loud pops to whistles to burps, depending on speed of the bite. Your kids loved the idea. But this is only half the secret. In addition to being Sonic, it’s: Natural, Oven-baked, Oil-free, Kalorie-free, and Yogurt-enriched. The staff affectionately names your pet project ‘SNOOKY the Cookie.’ Top management is excited. Sales potential is incredible if you get to the marketplace first." from, Corporate Espionage - The Missing Business School Courses

2021 - Hostess Brands, LLC is introducing a new texture-rich item for consumers looking to indulge their sweet tooth with the launch of its creamiest and crunchiest snack yet, Hostess Cr!spy Minis™. Available in two irresistible flavors, Cookies & Crème and Strawberries & Crème, the incredibly poppable Cr!spy Minis come in a resealable, stand-up pouch for optimal freshness. more

Ikea Fined $1.3 Million Over Spying

A French court ordered home furnishings giant Ikea to pay some 1.1 million euros ($1.3 million) in fines and damages Tuesday over a campaign to spy on union representatives, employees and some unhappy customers in France.

Two former Ikea France executives were convicted and fined over the scheme and given suspended prison sentences. Among the other 13 defendants in the high-profile trial, some were acquitted and others given suspended sentences.

Adel Amara, a former Ikea employee who helped expose the wrongdoing, called the ruling “a big step in defense of the citizen….It makes me glad that there is justice in France.” more  previous stories

Football Team Launches Retaliation Drone

As football rivalries go, the one between Chile and Argentina is up there among the fiercest. So it should come as no surprise that when Chile's national team saw a drone hovering above a training session, it suspected its rival of spying ahead of Thursday's World Cup qualifier.

The team sent up its own drone which swiftly brought down the "spy-cam".

But rather than being a devious Argentine device, the drone turned out to be from a Chilean energy company. more

New X-Ray Inspection and Analysis Service Detects Eavesdropping Devices Secreted in Everyday Objects

Click to enlarge.

Planting bugs, spy cameras, and other illegal surveillance devices is easy. Most come pre-disguised as fully functional everyday objects. They are being built into wall clocks, power strips, USB chargers, and even desktop calculators, for example.

Competent Technical Surveillance Countermeasures (TSCM) consultants have a variety of very effective ways to detect electronic surveillance devices. But, when the stakes are high enough—and the opposition is sophisticated enough—a Murray Associates TSCM X-ray deep clean is the logical option. This new service offers the most assurance that room objects are not bugged. 

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Kevin D. Murray, Director, relates an interesting cautionary tale, “There are also times when a TSCM X-ray deep clean is just smart due diligence. The classic example of a lack of due diligence is the KGB bugging of American typewriters during the Cold War.”

Popular Mechanics explains… “The Cold War spy drama that played out between the U.S. and the Soviet Union was the source of much ingenious spy technology. One of the most ingenious devices fielded by both sides was a typewriter designed to spy on the user, quietly transmitting its keystrokes to KGB listeners. The technology was an early form of keylogging but done entirely through hardware—not PC software.”

A total of 16 bugged typewriters were used at the U.S. Moscow embassy for over eight years before discovery. Had a TSCM X-ray inspection been conducted before the typewriters were installed, no secrets would have been lost.

Keep the KGB typewriters in mind when bringing in a new phone system, keyboards, mice or other office items. This is the ideal time to sneak a bug in, and for a TSCM X-ray deep clean.

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Murray Associates TSCM can economically inspect all your new arrivals at one time, at your location, or ours. And, discretely security seal your items at no extra charge—before you start using them.

When should a TSCM X-ray inspection be conducted?

• When the stakes are high.
• When the opposition is formidable.
• When the areas being inspected with regular TSCM methods are especially sensitive.
• Whenever you bring new tech into the workplace en masse. New desk phones, new computer equipment, new gifts, for example.
  

How often should an a TSCM X-ray deep clean be conducted?

• Once per year during the quarterly, proactive TSCM inspections. (Quarterly inspections are the norm for most businesses.)
• Whenever there are active suspicions of illegal electronic surveillance.
• Upon the discovery of a listening device or other suspicious object.


Counterespionage Tip: If one bug is discovered, keep searching. Professionals will plant multiple devices, with one being easy to find. Their strategy… to thwart further searching by inexperienced TSCM technicians.

Types of X-ray analysis services offered:

• On-site, when we are conducting a Technical Surveillance Countermeasures (TSCM) inspection for you.
• On-site, to inspect multiple new items entering your environment, such as new telephones, keyboards, computer mice, etc.
• Objects may also be mailed to the Murray Associates TSCM lab for X-ray analysis. Contact them directly for details.

Full Press Release
 

Watergate-style Scandal Rocks Bulgaria Ahead of Election

Bulgaria's National Security and Technical Operations agencies eavesdropped on opposition politicians in the run-up to last month's parliamentary elections, caretaker Interior Minister Boyko Rashkov said on Friday.

Why it matters: Rashkov was echoing echoing claims from a leading opposition politician, who said 32 politicians from three parties had been wiretapped. All three parties are opponents of the long-term ruling party, GERB, and former prime minister Boyko Borissov, who dominated Bulgarian politics for the past decade. more

Mystery Solved: The Govt Manager and the Spy Cam

A porn-addicted Government manager who planted a spy camera in a gym bathroom has had his discharge without conviction and permanent name suppression overturned and can now be identified.

He is Phillip Barnes, the former chief executive of International Accreditation New Zealand - a Crown organisation at the fore of the national Covid-19 pandemic response.

And he has issued a lengthy apology for his offending. more