Watch Out! Body-Worn Cameras Are All Around You

A frontline police officer submitted an op-ed revealing that superiors ignored the fact that security inside and outside financial institutions is generally ubiquitous and strictly guarded. They forced officers to shoulder unreasonable and inefficient duties, requiring them to use personal body-worn cameras inside financial institutions to universally and non-publicly record any citizens present, without explaining the legal basis. This has infringed upon people's privacy and right to informational self-determination.

In response, the Taipei City Police Department clarified that officers' use of body-worn cameras and the safekeeping, retrieval, and copying of their files strictly comply with relevant laws and regulations, striking a reasonable balance between maintaining public security and protecting human rights and privacy.

Police Indiscriminate Side-Recording During Duty

According to the National Police Agency's "Directions for Police Agencies on the Use of Micro-Cameras and the Preservation and Management of Audio-Visual Data During Duty," before contacting citizens in the performance of official duties or when individual cases dictate the necessity, officers must turn on body-worn cameras to continuously and completely record and process the course of events. After the duty shift ends, the audio-visual data must be transferred to a dedicated computer or external expansion hard drive, filed by year, month, and day, registered, backed up, and preserved for at least one month.

However, under Articles 9 and 10 of the Police Power Exercise Act, police recording evidence in public activities and places are subject to strict regulations, limited to situations where "there are factual grounds to believe that there is a risk of harm to public safety or order" or "it is necessary for the maintenance of public security." Therefore, police officers wearing body-worn cameras for "indiscriminate" side-recording during duty raise legality concerns unless explicitly authorized by provisions at the legislative act level.

Even more objectionable is that the aforementioned NPA "Management Directions" stipulate that, upon approval by a precinct chief, an official of equivalent rank, or their authorized personnel, police agencies may use and publish audio-visual data obtained from body-worn cameras, provide them to news media during public opinion explanations, or use them for crime prevention advocacy and education and training.

However, Articles 17 and 18 of the Police Power Exercise Act explicitly stipulate that police shall utilize evidentiary materials within the necessary scope of their statutory duties, which must be consistent with the specific purpose of collection; evidence that does not contribute to the completion of the task shall be destroyed. Accordingly, records captured through body-worn cameras are, in principle, prohibited from disclosure unless explicitly provided by law. Therefore, subsequent use and publication of footage by the police indeed carry the risk of illegality.

This also involves the protection of personal data. The police have previously argued that such materials fall under Article 51, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 2 of the Personal Data Protection Act regarding "audio-visual data collected, processed, or utilized in public places or public activities that are not combined with other personal data," and are thus exempt from the Personal Data Protection Act. However, with media coverage, such audio-visual data is mostly combined with specific individuals' names, social activities, and other data capable of identifying them. Therefore, unauthorized public disclosure by the police constitutes utilization beyond the statutory purpose of evidence collection, which clearly does not comply with the aforementioned statutory provisions.

Human Rights Awareness Must Be Further Raised

Two years ago, the Hong Kong police planned to replace officers' personal communication devices "Small Lobo" with new equipment featuring recording functions, triggering public concerns over privacy violations. Human rights organizations thus urged the police to disclose internal rules for using recording equipment. Today, "one country, two systems" exists in name only. Amidst comprehensive social stabilization by the Chinese authorities, who are strongly pushing artificial intelligence (AI) facial recognition for large-scale, indiscriminate surveillance, one can imagine how Hong Kong residents' panic over "police body-worn cameras infringing on civil rights" deepens day by day.

Thank goodness, Taiwan still preserves democracy and the rule of law, and the people still enjoy freedom and privacy. As long as the police's human rights awareness and legal concepts are raised by just a tiny bit, tomorrow will be even better!

※ This article was published in the Apple Daily on Apr. 19, 2019