Florida Statute § 934.03 regarding interception and disclosure of wire, oral, or electronic communications closely mirrors the United Code 18 U.S.C. § 2511(1)(a), which clearly sets forth the rights to privacy regarding communications. This includes recording conversations without the other’s consent/knowledge. Florida law regarding said interception is prohibited when there is an expectation of privacy. But what about calls that are inadvertently made?
Last week, the Sixth Circuit US Court of Appeals ruled against a Plaintiff who filed a law suit wherein the Defendant recorded a portion of his conversation with a third party and disseminated those recordings, as well as, the notes she had taken regarding the conversation to others. The phone call was inadvertently made by the Plaintiff through a “pocket-dial”. The Court ruled that a “person exposes his activities and statements, thereby failing to exhibit an expectation of privacy, if he inadvertently shares his activities and statements through neglectful use of a common telecommunication device.” The Court explained that the Plaintiff might have tried “locking the phone, setting up a passcode, and using one of many downloadable applications that prevent pocket-dials calls.”
The Court held “[i]n 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.”
Click here to read Florida Statute 934: http://www.leg.state.fl.us/Statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String&URL=0900-0999/0934/Sections/0934.03.html
Click here to read the Court’s ruling: https://consumermediallc.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/buttdialing.pdf
For more information on the article regarding the ruling, click here: https://www.yahoo.com/tech/s/butt-dials-arent-private-appeals-185719647.html
