home security camera

[jackie08]

Hi is it legal to put up my own security cameras in council property, or will i have to get permission first

[New Judge]

You may have to get permission (check your tenancy agreement or ask your landlord). But it is not "illegal" (that is, you cannot be prosecuted for it).

[Buenchico]

There are no specific laws involved here. (The restrictions applying to business premises, relating to the use of CCTV, don't apply to domestic properties).

However, as with any tenanted property (irrespective of whether the landlord is a local authority, housing association or a private landlord) there might be restrictions within the tenancy agreement related to, for example, drilling holes into wall.

So if your council would be happy for your to drill into the wall to put up, say, a bracket for a hanging flower basket, there should be no problem with you drilling into the wall to attach a camera. (i.e. there's no restriction on CCTV cameras, per se, but you might need to check up whether you're allowed to attach them to your walls).

Chris

[jackie08]

thank you both for your answers. I will look at my tenancy agreement :)

[Peter Pedant]

I think you should tell the council and also the reason - if you have been burgled
[if they say no, they are kinda underwriting future losses]

I think you should be registered with Data Protection - £35 a yr
altho the rest of this column dont
and that you should advertise the camera with a sticker in the window that can be seen from the street
and that finally the camera should not involve the street

ALTHOUGH your neighbours who are robbed will want to see your footage when they get done over and so WILL want you to include passers by on the street

Perhaps the difference between correspondents is the difference between cheyne walk and sir jamz anderton close
Clearly we orbit at different levels

[donnaanna]

we wanted to install camera to look over our spot in the car park and the vehicle gate as there were attempts to steel our motorcycle and the gate is constantly vandalised and cost huge amounts of money from our service charges to be repeared - and we found that lease states you have to ask permision, and permission was refused because landlord (in our case HA) were worried about being sued for taking imiges without residents authorisation... madness.

[TheTruthHere]

From the web

Images of people are covered by the Data Protection Act, and so is information about people which is derived from images – for example, vehicle registration numbers. Most uses of CCTV by organisations or businesses will be covered by the Act, regardless of the number of cameras or how sophisticated the equipment is.

The Data Protection Act does not apply to individuals’ private or household purposes. So if you install a camera on your own home to protect it from burglary, the Act will not apply.

[Buenchico]

Just to bring together Peter Pedant's & TheTruthHere's posts:

When the Data Protection Act first came into force the Data Protection Registrar (as he was then known) was of the opinion that domestic properties were covered by the Act and that, therefore, people installing CCTV to protect their homes were obliged to register under the Act.

However, following a court ruling, the Information Commissioner (as he is now known) has decided that domestic properties are not covered by the Act and hence registration is NOT required.

Chris