You can secretly snoop on someone if they butt-dial you – US judges A US court of appeals has ruled that phone calls started by accident in your pocket – so-called butt dialing – can be lawfully recorded. The Ohio Sixth Circuit appeals court found in favor [PDF] of a woman who recorded the conversations of a colleague who had unknowingly dialed her number before entering a meeting. James …
"In sum, a person who knowingly operates a device that is capable of inadvertently exposing his conversations to third-party listeners, and fails to take simple precautions to prevent such exposure, does not have a reasonable expectation of privacy with respect to statements that are exposed to an outsider by the inadvertent operation of that device."
hang on ... a person who knowingly operates a device (makes a call on a phone), that is capable of inadv exposing to 3rd party (all phones if network is tapped) and fails to take simple precautions (such as not making the call), does not have reasonable expectation of privacy?
"Well actually the sentiment seems to be that since he did the dialing, that was consent."
In fact, reading the judgement suggests that actual recording wasn't even mentioned - it's specifically about whether Spaw "intentionally intercepted" the call, and concludes that since Huff was the one who made the call, she didn't. The other part is regarding "intentional disclosure" of an intercepted call, which becomes irrelevant given the previous judgement. No recording was made, only handwritten notes, so the question of who might have consented to a recording doesn't come into it.
@Charles 9
"Trouble is, some instances of butt-dialing come from the fact the butt contact manages to complete the entire sequence of motions from pushing the power button to awaken the phone to the unlocking gesture to dialing."
Sounds like a good argument in favour of fingerprint sensors. They may not be more secure than a pin, but you should struggle to activate them with your arse. Although I'm not entirely sure how people's arses are apparently managing to operate capacitive touchscreens. I suspect there's a significant element of "accidentally hit redial before putting it in pocket" involved.
Actually Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, where the recording took place, is located in Kentucky so Ohio law wouldn't apply but Kentucky is also a single party consent state so that point is moot. The lawsuit was filed in Federal court which is why it was held in Ohio.
Now, with that said, it's possible Spaw would be in violation of KY Rev Stat § 526.060 (PDF) which states, in part,
A person is guilty of divulging illegally obtained information when he knowingly uses or divulges information obtained through eavesdropping or tampering with private communications or learned in the course of employment with a communications common carrier engaged in transmitting the message.
"The moral of the story: always lock your phone before stashing it, lest you incur a hefty long-distance charge and a business headache."
Trouble is, some instances of butt-dialing come from the fact the butt contact manages to complete the entire sequence of motions from pushing the power button to awaken the phone to the unlocking gesture to dialing. I've personally seen such things as well as butt-answering, so I've prudently chosen a belt clip for my phone which not only keeps the phone out of my pocket but also places a literal air gap between the screen and anything physical (which may still operate the screen if my body's touching the piece).
"In sum, a person who knowingly operates a device that is capable of inadvertently exposing his conversations to third-party listeners, and fails to take simple precautions to prevent such exposure, does not have a reasonable expectation of privacy with respect to statements that are exposed to an outsider by the inadvertent operation of that device."
In reality, I don't think he knowingly operated the device !!!
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