

Why Don’t Phones Let Us Record Calls? - joshaidan
http://www.brianjones.ca/archives/2012/04/10/why-dont-phones-let-us-record-calls/

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jerrya
"The law, at least in Canada, allows anyone to record a conversation they are
apart of without the consent of the other party for their own personal
reference, or journalistic purposes."

In my view, the US Federal and State laws on wiretapping are crazy and all
over the place.

Things that are illegal for the cops should not be the same as things that are
illegal for citizens.

And there seems to be a lot more good reasons to allow citizens to record
calls (without notification of the other party) they are part of than there
are reasons to disallow them.

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LinaLauneBaer
In Germany recording audio or video (without consent of the other party) is
illegal and you can even get in jail for this. The reason for it being illegal
is because the law wants people to be able to talk to each other without the
fear that everything can potentially be recorded. The law argues that this
fear would change interpersonal conversations in a wrong way.

~~~
pyre
I hope that there are exceptions for things like filming in public. You can
see how horrid such laws are when the police want to suppress citizen-made
films of their actions in the US...

~~~
LinaLauneBaer
There are exceptions. Recording in public is allowed in some cases. It mainly
depends on the number of people who are recorded at the same time. If this
number is high enough the restrictions become more relaxed.

And please note that I am only describing the situation in Germany without
judging the situation. :-)

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joshaidan
Here's a mirror of the post on my tumblr, as my server may be taking a bit of
a beating:

[http://joshaidan.tumblr.com/post/20853092085/why-dont-
phones...](http://joshaidan.tumblr.com/post/20853092085/why-dont-phones-let-
us-record-calls)

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JamisonM
Seems to me that a Nokia Series 60 Smartphone that I had did record calls, but
it made an annoying beeping sound that both parties could hear every minute or
so. The explanation in the manual was that due to the laws in some countries
they made the audible beep so the other party would know they are being
recorded. It was an interesting way to "solve" this problem that seemed
invented by paranoid lawyers but it did make the recording function more or
less useless.

~~~
Monotoko
I remember a few years back, I was on the phone to a friend of mine a lot and
I kept hearing a beep. I asked her what it was, she said she couldn't hear it.

Now I remember she had a Nokia 5800, so someone I don't speak to any more has
all logs of our conversations, and I didn't even know until now. That makes me
feel very violated in all honesty.

~~~
Terretta
If you didn't say anything wrong, you have nothing to fear, citizen.

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zachbeane
The legal issues are not as simple outside of Canada.

~~~
Splines
What if I'm in Canada and call someone in the US? Which laws apply?

Alternatively, what if I'm in the US, call someone in Canada, and they
conference call a 3rd person in the US?

~~~
jetti
Typically you only need to follow the laws that are applicable in the region
you are in. However, there are times where you can be tried for breaking a law
in a country you don't reside because you have knowingly and willingly broke
that law and tried to get residents of that nation to do the same. The
instance of where that happens is Richard O'Dyer
([http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120113/09184917400/us-
to-...](http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120113/09184917400/us-to-extradite-
uk-student-copyright-infringement-despite-site-being-legal-uk.shtml) first
link that I found quickly).

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Yarnage
Manufacturers about 6+ years ago used to allow this. Almost every Windows
Mobile phone I had had the ability to do this with a custom application.

I would suspect the manufacturer wouldn't be liable if you put a disclaimer on
it but IANAL. It would sure be nice, however...

~~~
isnotchicago
I think my old LG VX8700 (from 2007) had this functionality as well.
Interestingly, it only recorded the other side of the conversation (not
powerful enough to record both phone-in and mic-in at the same time?).

I wonder what caused manufacturers to start removing the feature.

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rmoriz
Why doesn't let us the iPhone block incoming phone numbers? It's rediculous!

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joshaidan
It also presents an interesting case, if the end user had the ability to
record calls, would that then cut down on law enforcements need to wiretap
calls to get recordings for evidence?

Would this be a reason to rethink anti-recording laws to allow the public to
record conversations? I think it's better if the public has the power to
decide when their calls are recorded, than the government without our consent.

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ja27
There are a number of call recorders on Android. I used vRecorder for quite a
while. Sometimes (often?) they only record what the microphone hears, so the
caller on the line's voice can be pretty low.

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moondev
The MIUI rom for android allows two-way call recording.

~~~
lsiebert
Through accessing the audio streams or through the microphone (hearing the
earpiece with the mic)? Because last time I checked, only the latter worked on
phones from certain manufacturers.

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epikur
If you use Google Voice, you can press "4" to record incoming calls.

~~~
Casseres
From what I understand, it notifies the party that you are trying to record.
If you are in a "one party" state, you may not want that. There are some
companies that will hang up instantly when hearing that, even when they
themselves play a disclaimer that the call may be recorded.

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maeon3
When computers start not doing what we want them to do because of laws...
Lookout. Im sorry dave, i won't print that, or copy it, or show it, because a
senator's notary is on it, and it may contain corruption or fraud. According
to law xyz, this file has been deleted. Please call your local senator to file
a complaint.

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gcb
Star/upvote/like/+1 this:

<http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=15872>

