Summary
Are we required to notify callers or meeting attendees that their call or meeting may be recorded? The question was posed to district legal counsel for their guidance and advice.
Intended Audience
- All staff and non-staff
Question
Do we have a requirement to notify a caller (or meeting attendee) that we are or may be recording the call (or meeting)?
When we receive a call via Microsoft Teams we have the option to transcribe the call, which is very helpful to ensure we don’t miss a single detail of the call.
This seems very close to an audio recording but just done via AI technology.
Answer
Garrett Hemann Robertson P.C. - Attorneys at Law - 12/05/2024
This is an interesting question. Recently, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the portion of our state law that required two-party consent for recording conversations. In fact, that statute already allowed for recording of phone conversations or other electronically transported conversations. So there’s nothing illegal about transcriptions or recordings without consent.
However, I typically prefer that we always notify the person we intend to record and respect their wishes if they choose not to be recorded. I use that same practice with transcriptions as well. In my experience, Teams, Zoom, and other platforms usually notify the participants that they are being notified or transcribed, correct? I usually still verbally tell people if we plan to use recording or transcription technology as a courtesy.
There’s also the other question of where and how this will be stored if there is a transcription or recording file made. I’m sure that’s something you have already considered as well, but we would want to make sure that any cloud storage is secure and FERPA-compliant, as well as maintained according to the retention schedule from the Secretary of State.
District Stance
Any time a call or meeting is going to be recorded, the person recording the call or meeting will advise attendees that the call or meeting will be recorded.
If the caller or attendee does not consent to being recorded, the district will respect the request to not record the session.
Storage of calls or meeting will be determined by the district Records Manager and approved by TIS Management.
Additional Help
If assistance is still needed after completing the above steps, please let TIS know by submitting a ticket.