Norway warns of 'peeping tom' drones
Richard Orange - [email protected]
Published: 1 Nov, 2013 CET.
Updated: Fri 1 Nov 2013 13:31 CET
Norway's privacy watchdog has warned that high-tech 'peeping Toms' are starting to use drones to peer through peoples' upstairs windows, raising new privacy issues.
"We anticipate that this will become more of a problem in the future, as this technology is getting cheaper and more sophisticated by the minute," Trude Talberg-Furlund, a senior advisor at the agency said. She said that although the agency had so far only received a handful of complaints, it was worried that peeping Toms, as well as paparazzi journalists and even the police would start to misuse the technology. Karl Rasmussen, a retired businessman from Bergen, alerted the authority earlier this year when a friend's tenant was startled by a drone peering in through his bathroom window. "One of his tenants found this drone right outside his bathroom, " Rasmussen told The Local. "The tenants were from Eastern Europe so they were very sceptical about spying, and anyway you don't want people looking in at you when you're in the bathroom." Rasmussen challenged the man operating the drone, who claimed he was shooting aerial photos of a nearby plot of land for a property sale. "I pretty sure that was correct, but there was no reason to go flying outside someone's bathroom window," Rasmussen said. "I think he was a peeping Tom, I think he was just doing it for fun. He was just curious as to what other people were doing." The inspectorate was also contacted earlier this month by a woman in Oslo, who had looked out of her 10th floor apartment's window to fund a helicopter drone hovering outside, peering in with a camera.
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"We anticipate that this will become more of a problem in the future, as this technology is getting cheaper and more sophisticated by the minute," Trude Talberg-Furlund, a senior advisor at the agency said.
She said that although the agency had so far only received a handful of complaints, it was worried that peeping Toms, as well as paparazzi journalists and even the police would start to misuse the technology.
Karl Rasmussen, a retired businessman from Bergen, alerted the authority earlier this year when a friend's tenant was startled by a drone peering in through his bathroom window.
"One of his tenants found this drone right outside his bathroom, " Rasmussen told The Local. "The tenants were from Eastern Europe so they were very sceptical about spying, and anyway you don't want people looking in at you when you're in the bathroom."
Rasmussen challenged the man operating the drone, who claimed he was shooting aerial photos of a nearby plot of land for a property sale.
"I pretty sure that was correct, but there was no reason to go flying outside someone's bathroom window," Rasmussen said. "I think he was a peeping Tom, I think he was just doing it for fun. He was just curious as to what other people were doing."
The inspectorate was also contacted earlier this month by a woman in Oslo, who had looked out of her 10th floor apartment's window to fund a helicopter drone hovering outside, peering in with a camera.
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