Latest news with #privacyViolation
ABC News
4 days ago
- General
- ABC News
Women filmed in bathroom without their consent, former housemate to be sentenced over violation
When Sarah* moved into her first Sydney share house, the Canadian expat thought it was a "completely safe, normal environment". Months after moving out, she would find out it was the backdrop of a horrific violation of privacy and trust, perpetrated by her former male housemate. Luis Alberto Cancino Mena had placed three female housemates under intimate surveillance without their knowledge or consent. The 39-year-old man had set up a secret camera to film Sarah and two other women in a communal bathroom — including in the shower — and in one of their bedrooms. After being called into a local police station, the 27-year-old said she sat in shock as she had to review one of several videos taken of her. "I felt violated, scared, confused — I couldn't believe someone could do such a thing," Sarah said. "It's something that you would see on TV or in movies but never something that you could imagine happening to you." Court documents show that cleaners at the home located a camera device shaped like a pen on the ground of the bathroom before they pulled it apart and found that it was recording. After removing the storage device card inside, they found files of themselves cleaning the bathroom and a woman taking a shower. The property owner took it to police. Officers found a recording of Cancino setting the camera up and said he "made full and frank admissions" when interviewed by police. The documents also showed that one woman was recorded in both the shared bathroom and inside her bedroom, with videos saved on his laptop under a folder with her name. That is where a folder labelled "Sarah" was also found. All three victims were unaware of the camera and did not give Cancino consent to film them. "It definitely put me on edge, made me trust people less because of it and I just want this chapter of my life closed so I can move on." Cancino, from Chile, is expected to be sentenced on Thursday after pleading guilty to three counts of intentionally record intimate video/image without consent. Court documents show Cancino is in Australia on a temporary visa, which is about to expire. His passport was seized by police and the documents show he told police he intended to return to Chile and not return to Australia. Sarah said she wants justice and has been attending each court appearance. "It was definitely scary [seeing him in person again]. My heart was beating out of my chest … he's a predator, he's a criminal," Sarah said. "It was an attack on women, and I don't think a person like that deserves to be here in Australia … ultimately I just want him to get what he deserves." The NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research (BOSCAR) said there were 422 finalised charges relating to recording or threatening to record intimate images without consent in 2024. The data shows an uptick to the previous year, with 267 finalised charges in 2023. "Despite the recent increase in charges, the proportion of proven charges has remained similar in 2024 (43 per cent proven) compared to the previous year (48 per cent proven in 2023)," BOSCAR said in a statement. Monash Gender and Family Violence Prevention Centre director Associate Professor Bridget Harris said it was hard to know just how common this is because there could be many cases that go undetected. "We don't have the stats on this, but I would suspect, given other rates of technology-facilitated abuse, that gender and sexually diverse people are also experiencing high rates of digital voyeurism," Dr Harris said. Dr Harris, who leads Monash Criminology, said more needs to be done to target the ideologies that drive this type of harm, recognising that it as a form of gendered control and sense of entitlement to someone's body. She said often those most subjected to these harms are expected to try and prevent them. "It's just another form of … safety work that women will do, or other targets will do to try and prevent violence from happening and the burden is really often with victim survivors, especially when there aren't enough mechanisms to help in detecting or regulating or stopping this harm." Sarah said she wants to warn others in the rental market to stay vigilant, acknowledging it was yet "another thing women have to worry about." "I think the rental market is so crazy… and we kind of let our guard down and let things slide just trying to get into a place," Sarah said. "I know that something like this is not my fault. "I didn't do anything to have this happen and there was nothing I could've done to prevent it. So speaking out, having my truth told, was important." *Sarah's surname has been withheld for privacy reasons.
CTV News
23-05-2025
- CTV News
Man suing Airbnb after finding hidden camera inside smoke detector
An Arkansas family is suing Airbnb after finding a hidden camera in a smoke detector in a property they visited in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Telegraph
08-05-2025
- Telegraph
Doctor jailed for filming colleagues with hidden cameras in bathroom
A doctor who installed hidden cameras in a bathroom to secretly record 24 people has been jailed. Ju Young Um, 34, hid the cameras in air fresheners to film his victims over more than three years. The anaesthetist was found guilty of 23 charges in April following a trial at Glasgow sheriff court and was jailed for 18 months when he appeared there for sentencing on Thursday, the Crown Office said. Prosecutors said he installed hidden cameras at his property in the Hyndland area of Glasgow, which had been partially rented out on Airbnb. One victim became suspicious after noticing two air fresheners that appeared to be facing the lavatory and shower, prosecutors said. On closer inspection, hidden cameras were discovered inside the plastic containers, and a further search found a third camera inside a smoke alarm. The victim contacted police and the cameras were seized along with a mobile phone, laptop and storage device which contained recordings of several people. Um was also found guilty of covertly filming people in private situations within staff accommodation at Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary. Fraser Gibson, procurator fiscal for Glasgow and Strathkelvin, said: 'Ju Young Um carried out these invasive offences in a calculated and premeditated manner. 'He abused a position of trust to significantly violate the privacy of numerous individuals for his own sexual gratification. 'I give thanks to all those involved in securing this prosecution, which has held Um accountable while also protecting others from harm. 'We will continue to take action against those responsible for this type of offending as we strive to keep the communities we serve safe.' The offences took place between November 2020 and August 2024. Um will remain on licence for a further nine months once he is released from prison, during which time he will be subject to close monitoring and supervision. His name has been added to the sex offenders register for 10 years. 'Despicable actions' Det Sgt Cameron Gilchrist, of Police Scotland, said: 'Ju Young Um now faces the consequences of his despicable and distressing actions. 'Our thoughts remain with his victims who had their privacy violated. We hope that his sentencing will bring them some comfort. 'Sexual crime, of any nature, is not to be tolerated and we will thoroughly investigate any reports made to us, no matter how much time has passed. 'I would urge people to come forward and you can be assured of being fully supported by officers and our partner agencies.'
The Guardian
08-05-2025
- The Guardian
Is your school spying on your child online?
When it premiered last month, the Amazon docuseries Spy High reminded Americans how, in 2009, Pennsylvania's Lower Merion school district remotely activated its school-issued laptop webcams to capture 56,000 pictures of students outside of school, including in their bedrooms. There are few places where the use of student surveillance technology feels more threatening than in the room where children undress, sleep and engage in other private conduct, and that is why the intrusions featured in Spy High are so disturbing. Fortunately, in the 16 years since Lower Merion's misconduct was revealed, we have not seen another webcam-based privacy violation of a similar scale. But as the parent of two public school students, I take little comfort in that achievement, because I know there is another, ultra-private place that schools are intruding upon virtually every minute of every day: our children's minds. As Spy High correctly observes, after the Covid-19 pandemic closed US schools at the dawn of this decade, student surveillance technologies were conveniently repackaged as 'remote learning tools' and found their way into virtually every K-12 school, thereby supercharging the growth of the $3bn EdTech surveillance industry. To avoid losing its Covid-19 windfall as the pandemic eased, the EdTech surveillance industry pivoted back to its original mission, claiming – without reliable evidence – that its products were a highly effective means of preventing student violence and suicide. In reality, products by well-known EdTech surveillance vendors such as Gaggle, GoGuardian, Securly and Navigate360 review and analyze our children's digital lives, ranging from their private texts, emails, social media posts and school documents to the keywords they search and the websites they visit. In 2025, wherever a school has access to a student's data – whether it be through school accounts, school-provided computers or even private devices that utilize school-associated educational apps – they also have access to the way our children think, research and communicate. That means the private conversations, thoughts and mistakes today's parents made as kids, which went unnoticed by the larger world, are now as readily accessible to schools as a student's grades. As schools normalize perpetual spying, today's kids are learning that nothing they read or write electronically is private. Accordingly, kids are learning that the safest way to avoid revealing their private thoughts, and potentially subjecting themselves to discipline, may be to stop or sharply restrict their digital communications and to avoid researching unpopular or unconventional ideas altogether. As if George Orwell himself were one of their teachers, they are learning that Big Brother is indeed watching them, and that negative repercussions may result from thoughts or behaviors the government does not endorse. That is no way to raise a generation of children. The final episode of Sky High is titled Canary in a Coal Mine, but sadly the early warning provided by Lower Merion has gone largely unheeded. Instead, US schools have continued to march straight into the mine, spending billions on student surveillance products that do not work as advertised, harm students and take resources away from more reliable interventions. Fortunately, there are actions we can take to reverse course. For one, if the federal government is truly as interested in cutting waste as it claims, it should stop feeding the fraud by funding schools' purchases of unproven student surveillance technologies. And for parents, the greatest children's advocates of all, we can act locally to guide our schools toward better decision-making. Specifically, before any student surveillance products are purchased in the name of promoting student safety, parents should insist their schools answer three basic questions. Question one: other than the biased marketing materials provided by the EdTech surveillance companies themselves, what independent, reliable evidence do you have that their products work as advertised? Question two: what harms might be caused to students, especially the most vulnerable ones, by the use of the surveillance product? And question three: what alternative products and interventions are available, at a similar or lower cost, to keep our students safe? Believe it or not, most schools who use student surveillance products never answer these questions. If parents start insisting they do so before signing any surveillance contracts, schools will be far more likely to eschew the use of these 'student safety' products that, in reality, only place our kids at greater risk. Chad Marlow is an ACLU senior policy counsel and the principal author of Digital Dystopia: The Danger in Buying What the EdTech Surveillance Industry Is Selling
