Woman caught on CCTV performing drunken BJ blew right to privacy Ofcom has rejected a claim that Channel 4 infringed the privacy of a pregnant Southampton woman by broadcasting CCTV footage of her administering drunken oral pleasure to a chap in a tower block lift. "Ms K" lodged a complaint of "unwarranted infringement of privacy" to the TV watchdog regarding the 9 June 2014 episode of CCTV …
Not to defend her initial acts, but to be fair, I don't think any further damage was possible while some gain might have been (if she would have succeeded) - in a similar situation, it's not the 99.9999% of the world that I will never meet is what I would worry about finding out, but the 0.0001% that I personally know, and it seems those people already knew about the whole affair.
"TV programmes can be transmitted many months after the material is filmed. And being "very drunk" is occasionally how pregnancies start."
You are almost certainly right. However I could not resist the Daily Mail style outrage opportunity this gave me...
(Plus I would be genuinely sad if you are wrong)
The Ofcom report says
she had been very drunk and that she had not been 'at the best point in her life'
Perhaps becoming pregnant caused her to change her lifestyle. She certainly cared enough to complain.
I can't be bothered to dive into the report to unearth the delay between the recording of the footage and the transmission of the programme. But if it was more than eighteen months then I would view that an issue. All of us have done silly things in the past and there's no need for them to remain in the public domain in perpetuity. For the same reason, I think it raises an issue about how long this footage can remain available.
"She certainly cared enough to complain."
Or she saw one of the many ads for ambulance-chasing lawyers on television. Maybe even in the ad breaks of said documentary.
Did someone do something you don't like? Call Leeches4U No win, no fee*.
* Disclaimer: we will bill someone, somewhere just not you.
I suspect the WTF in the original related to finding such ladylike behaviour in Southampton - she would be "meeting the parents" material compared to some of the locals...
I particularly liked how she was worried that the programme may hurt her future employment opportunities. Does she really expect us to believe she will seek gainful employment at some point in her life?
IIRC there is, or at least there used to be, a let out in the law which made urinating in a public place an offence along the lines 'but if you're pregnant its OK'.
I think this goes back a very long time when there were few public toilets and the legislators, who tended to think women were a slightly different species anyway, managed to figure out that if you have a foetus sitting on your bladder its capacity might be impaired.
That said, recent overhauls to the law might have closed to loophole on the grounds there are a lot more public toilets and the Council needs the income.
"unexpected outbreak of common sense in a Regulator's judgement."
How on earth is this common sense? CCTV cameras are not there for amusement, they are supposed to be there for protection. I was always under the impression that there were rules regarding what the footage could/couldn't be used for, and that the purpose was supposed to be protection.
Given this usage has now been ruled legitimate, I'm forced to conclude that I am no longer in favour of the millions of CCTV cameras "protecting" us. Regardless of what she was doing, it shouldn't have been broadcast on TV for entertainment purposes.
If she was committing a crime, then use the tape as evidence.
If she couldn't be identified, use just enough footage to ask the public to help identify her.
Given that they don't appear to be prosecuting her for urinating in the lift (the only actual crime described, assuming that's illegal) then the footage should be destroyed.
When did the rules on CCTV change?
> How on earth is this common sense? CCTV cameras are not there for amusement, they are supposed to be there for protection
Exactly. This is just counter-productive.
Besides, if she decides to take this to court I am not so certain a judge will concur with Ofcom's opinion. It seems a clear misuse of security camera footage.
Having now googled it, she really ought to pursue this case under the DPA.
Guidance is at https://ico.org.uk/media/for-organisations/documents/1542/cctv-code-of-practice.pdf and clearly suggests this is in violation of the rules.
For instance, the signage should tell the public that they are being monitored, and for what purpose. If the lift said "for the purpose of crime prevention" then selling footage to C4 is clearly not that. There are many, many other rules broken here though.
People should also put aside specifics that colour their judgement and realize that the category that Ofcom has just allowed this usage for is not "women giving blowjobs" but "things that the reality TV audiences find entertaining". Anything you do that is embarrassing or which others will laugh at or be titillated by is now fair game if caught on camera. They just have to make a token effort to obscure your identity.
The cameras should not be there to catch people's errors so that your typical Big Brother viewer can find it funny. It's a quick bit of cash for a CCTV company and years of misery for those pilloried on television.
Playing Devil's Advocate here. This is where the law for the masses & the rich differ. Someone who could afford a decent lawyer might argue..
(I haven't seen the footage so below is based solely on ElReg article)
a) the fact she was subsequently identified proves CH4 did not do enough to anonymize the footage.
b) who owned the cameras? (breach of trust, data protection etc)
c) the man tried to cover the camera in order to gain privacy (ie: reverse argument of Ofcom).
d) a crime was allegedly committed - why did CH4 not report it to the police, await the outcome then proceed based upon the result?
(I am by no means a fan of the mentality that pisses in lifts btw)
You and many others with the same kind of thinking should have thought twice before the CCTV wave arrived from Northern Ireland.
You can watch old documentaries and movies to assure yourself of that, if you didn't already know.
Personally, I have no intention of tracking the video down, but it sounds hilariously bad, like an early Paul Morrissey or John Waters effort, except that nobody was acting.
Writing that has changed my mind, I now want to see this tawdry pile of excreta, but if never able to do so, it will not break my heart.
But they ARE protecting us.
They are there to protect us from muggers ... I am sure you would be happy for images of a mugger to be shown on TV
They are there to protect us from vandals ... if someone spray-painted the lift I am sure you would be happy for their image to be shown on TV
They are there to protect us from people who urinate in lifts and make them unusable by the rest of the block ... I am more than happy for that image to be shown on TV.
Please god tell me that now she has come forward and identified herself, the council is going to prosecute her for the damage and costs of cleaning it up etc etc.
It might not have prevented her -
But I'll bet it'll make the next slag think twice .
Err, No, hang on a minute ...........
Actually, fk it. I can see all sorts of potential problems if the principle runs riot - but - (whilst I don't care a monkeys about her giving someone a blowjob) If some antisocial cow pisses all over the lift, plaster stills of the event including her face on local billboards and do the same with all the other low-level arseholes who fk up society. Its cheap, its efficient, and its commensurate.
And for everyone who hasn't been in a piss-stinking lift in a highrise, experience that before you start preaching about her 'right' to privacy. This is not disproportionate.
"Now she has identified herself they can send a bill for cleaning up the mess... + fine
(don't know how the UK is, but here the fine for urinating in public is 60 euro)"
It does rather raise the question of why any mention of a fine is absent, doesn't it? A quick Google suggests a penalty on the order of £80.00.
"It does rather raise the question of what part of Ofcom "ruling" you did not understand."
Ah, self-satisfied AC snarking. Always good value for money.
"cannot have a legitimate expectation of privacy in circumstances where their behaviour is severely anti-social and contravenes public decency in the manner shown in the CCTV footage i.e. urinating on the floor of a communal lift and performing a sex act in a communal lift".
That's likely to be an actionable offence, and I'd reckon any such sentence would have a significant bearing on the outcome of the Ofcom ruling (that I understood just fine, thanks) and would be relevant background. But please, continue to snipe from cover if it shores up your fragile ego.
No offense is committed in the leaving of urine on a floor.
An offense may be committed in the act of urination if the genitals are willingly exposed to other persons, in which case the offence of "exposure" (sexual offences act 2003 section 66) is committed (he also means she).
Having sex with a person who is drunk may well be considered, by a court, to be rape if the person involved is incapable of consenting to sex.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
