RE: [Leica] Asking permission, KISS & the decisive moment

["Tim Atherton" <tim@KairosPhoto.com>]

> With the exception of France, which has crazy privacy laws, I have never
> heard of a successful court case where a private individual succeeded
> against photography in a public place in any country.  Does anyone know of
> one?


Quebec, which likes to think of itself as a country... ;-)  And whose laws
are French based.

In Canada, under our Privacy Act, businesses (including a one man show like
Ted or I) are not permitted to either collect or store data and information
on a private individual - this includes photographs - without permission.
There are specific exemptions for Press/Media use and Artistic use. However,
the act is so new that neither of these terms has been defined by the
courts. In an e-mail to me about this issue, the Privacy Commissioner hinted
that he would be using the Quebec privacy/photography case I mention as a
precedent in defining these two terms. In which case, he seems to be erring
on the side of privacy against free expressions. Eventually someone is going
to have to make a Charter of Rights challenge to the Supreme Court about one
of his decisions.

As this Privacy Act is only in force in parts of Canada right now, it is
going to be an interesting time to see what effect it has. There is a
general move in society (N America and Europe esp.)towards protection of
personal privacy and away from freedom of expression. The balance is
changing (cf the individual privacy/photography laws in various US States)

On the German law, the only thing I could come across was a law of 1907
which prohibited the photography of people without their permission. Even if
it is still on the books, since then Germany has enacted a Constitution
which includes the Rights of freedom of expression and freedom of the press.
A look at the rules of conduct of the German Press Council, which were quite
detailed, included nothing against obtaining permission for publication of
an photograph of an identifiable person. So, I'd still like to know, where
is the German Statute on this? A couple of Polizei saying it's forbidden
(and possibly harking back to an outdated law?) doesn't mean much. The cops
in Canada and the US will try the same one on even though you have a right
to do so.


Tim

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