China: Traffic Cameras Used for Voyeurism

China: Traffic Cameras Used for Voyeurism
Traffic cameras in Shenzhen, China used to spy on women in nearby apartments.

ChinaTraffic cameras in Shenzhen, China are being used for voyeurism. Earlier this month, officials from the Shenzhen Public Security Bureau arrested two control room employees named Liang and Xie who had used the traffic camera at Tangle Plaza in the district of Luohu to zoom in on nearby apartments instead of traffic.

A video recording from May 3 shows this camera followed the movements of a woman in her home for almost an hour. The video included footage of the woman in the shower. After some of these images inadvertently made their way to a public web server, a man who had been looking for traffic information tipped off a reporter for the South Metropolis Daily newspaper. The paper's investigation found that the camera had been focused on well-lit bedrooms in nearby apartments from midnight to 5:30am over the course of several days.

Shenzhen currently has no privacy regulations governing the use of video cameras. There are 210,000 surveillance cameras used in Guangzhou.

Source: Anger over peeping traffic cam (China Daily, 5/13/2008