This video got me wondering. If I build a fence, or earthen wall, around my property to keep my goings-on private do I have a reasonable expectation of privacy?

If a nosy neighbor stands on a step stool on his side of the barrier for the sole purpose of observing my behavior does he have the right to do so?

Is there even a reasonable expectation of privacy on your property once you've constructed a privacy fence? Is there a point where, legally, the fence is enough of a statement that deliberately bypassing it is civilly actionable or information obtained by looking over it becomes inadmissable?

Can we just split into two countries now?

Let the lefty libturds run things their way on their side and let us be free from their control freak lunacy on our side.

I would predict that they would be completely bankrupt in under 2 years best case.

I think you have a right not to have some asshole fly a drone on your property.

You'd get better results with 3 1/2" steel loads I think.

You do not own your airspace...but you do have a reasonable right to privacy on private property if you take the time to put up an obstacle that gets in the way of "Open field" rules...so I side with the hunters...

Yes, and no. A casual obsever whose flight path "just happened" to cross over my property is far different from someone flying above me for the purposes of monitoring activity there. At least to me anyhow.

According to the FAA shooting down a drone is equal to shooting down any other aircraft.
Not that I agree with it, but I wouldn't go shooting down any drones.link to story

Really? Even at machine gun shoots where people fly RC plans for the sole purpose of getting shot down?



 

If you read that article and the quotes from the FAA rules it is as clear as mud. Google the topic and you will find similar references.

We cover this UAV topic at work as emerging in our industry, and there are many issues coming up that have never been effectively covered before.

I wouldn't want to risk shooting down someone's property at this point. But that's just me.

I just bought my son a cheap quadcopter. He's a little young, so accidental mid-air collisions could happen if someone tried to fly one into our yard.

Are you planning on reporting yourself to the FAA?

The video was to start a conversation about if property owner's rights to privacy begins at the construction of a visual barrier.

What you do about the invasion has been covered at length.

I'd say your property begins at the line and extends in a cube up to navigable airspace within the purview of the FAA.

This.


30ft above my head in my field?  That thing is going down.

It's not the first nor last time they will be shot down over pigeon shots or other hunting/shooting venues. PETA talking about being cruel to animals is pure BS. They kill around 90% of the animals they take in.

Who the fuck is us? Are you dumb enough to believe either 'side' all agrees on the same shit? Its America, suck it up sweetheart.

A well done live Pigeon shoots is an amazing event.

Plus, pigeons taste like doves.  They are essentially large meaty doves

USSC would probably say "plain sight" just like in your car.

Once you conceal your activity behind a barrier it's no longer in plain sight.

A person would have to go out of their way to observe your actions or possessions.

Some asshole flies a drone over my house for more than just an A-B flight, as in hovering, looking?  

Yeah, I'm going to start trying to take that thing down.  My house, my airspace.  He can come tell me to my face if he doesn't like it.  I wouldn't shoot it, as discharging a firearm within the city is illegal....but I'm not going to have a drone over my property.  

This is one area where a law/regulation needs to be written that clearly prevents drone operators from using their drones to spy on people's property that would otherwise be blocked from view from a person standing on the street.

So you wouldn't be really upset if your wife was sunning herself on your back porch, with a privacy fence surrounding the area.....and then some punk kid with a drone was tapping off while his drone gave him a birds-eye view of her?

That's not wrong?  That's not completely fucked up?

Or be out for a casual flight in a private plane.

Or be out playing with their ultralight aircraft.

Or be taking a ride in their hot air balloon.

Or be testing out their new multiple helium balloon modification for their lawn chair.


Now if you decide to build a ferrocement dome over your lawn and house...  then I'd say you've got that expectation of privacy thing nailed down.

A couple decades or so ago, MTSU had a 'high rise' dorm that was 'women only'.  Since the building was all female, and it was taller than anything around for quite some distance, there was apparently nude sunbathing taking place on the roof.

The city airport is a short distance to the north.  Eventually, somebody made it too obvious that the roof was visible, by buzzing a bit too close to the roof of the dorm, while the ladies were sunning themselves..


There was also a nudist colony, somewhere north of the airport.  I was told that every Guard pilot in the state knew exactly where that nudist colony was.



Welcome to last century.

In a world where people can literally see through walls with a few thousand dollars worth of equipment, is "privacy" even a valid concept anymore?

You missed the part where I mentioned I did NOT agree with the rule.

Most certainly I am not going to risk the potential consequences to prove a point.
As for the peeping, that can be done from my neighbors window too. Do I shoot at their kid in the window?
No, I call the cops or knock on the door. (Depending on the side of the house it is.)

I know we are all very passionate and impulsive around here, so as the OP mentioned committing a potential crime I wanted to bring a little reason to the topic.
But I guess that just crazy talk around here. Carry on.

Op, you need to define the scope of your question. Civilly, criminally?

Plain view, as mentioned above, is  an exception to the warrant requirement. Cops have to have a legal right to be in the place where they are observing contraband/illegal activity.

Curtilage is the land immediately surrounding your home and is often has a higher expectation of privacy. A cop walking onto your land, grabbing a ladder, and looking over your
giant fence to see the lush pot trees you have going in the backyard probably isn't going to fly (as he likely has no legal right to be there), nor is the subsequent warrant based on that
knowledge, or the cop walking up to your door and trying to create an exigency.

Civilly, there are different actions that can be taken depending on a bunch of different facts, but look up spite fences and private nuisance for some laughs

eta:

I get what you're saying, but we always have to push back against encroachments on our privacy. Kyllo, a supreme court case involving police use of thermal imaging, did not render the fourth amendment moot because
technology was readily available that went around our normal concept of privacy. I like to point that out to people that argue that the government would massacre any sort of civilian resistance, so the second amendment is moot. It is a poor argument that just because the government has technology and resources that could render rights pointless, that they should be able to and you shouldn't have the right.

I kinda touched on that a few posts up.

I'm mostly talking about thwarting a persistent peeker like PETA, or the Gladys Kravitz type. Is deliberately looking over or otherwise bypassing a privacy fence an offense for which I could seek an injunction or civil judgement? (Sue them for the cost of building an even higher fence?)

Are you going to sue your city government?  Odds are fairly good that they have used aerial photomapping, to update their maps used for city planning and tax appraisals.  

Up until recently, the county parcel maps (maintained by the planning department) for my area showed every structure that was easily visible from above, even if it was over a quarter mile from a public road, but did not show the cabin that is on the other side of a rock wall from my land.  That cabin has been there for at least 40 years, but was under the canopy of several large trees, and the county didn't know it was there.  

I took another look at the parcel maps, a couple weeks ago, when I was researching the deeds of neighboring parcels, and the maps had been updated to show that cabin.  The updated maps were also a little more accurate, since the older maps had showed a couple buildings as being on the property lines, while they are actually in compliance with the required distance from those property lines, and the new maps show them in the correct locations.

I guess they finally had a photomapping contractor update their maps during the winter, when the leaves were off those trees.

Go online, get plans for rf jammer, get parts from mouser and digikey, wait until quad copter is over property, ACTIVATE!

Oh look, I have a new bird to add to my stable.

That, or I'll pull out my Align TREX 450L Dominator and fuck his shit up.

Actually, you may up to a certain height.  This prevents neighbors from running wires and such across your property to connect elsewhere (think HAM radio operators).  Each municipality is different.  In mine, I actually do own some airspace above my property.

Can we split into 3 countries::

1) Conservatives with guns
2) Liberals with guns
3) Liberals without guns

The FAA controls ALL air space, from the ground up. The way the laws are written NOW, it's not illegal to fly a drone over someone else's property.



I expect this will change pretty soon. First at the local/city/state level, and then the Federal level.



 

IIRC wasn't the shoot-down considered kosher because the drone was interfering with a lawful hunt?

Kharn