Access-control technology
Gates, fobs, cameras, and intercoms raise a legal question most boards never ask.
Access control technology, gate keypads, key fobs, cameras, and intercoms, is generally fine to install. The legal question boards miss is audio. Recording video of a common area and recording the conversations that happen there are treated as separate legal questions, and turning on a device's microphone can require consent from everyone speaking, not just the association.
Video and audio are not the same legal question
Most access control technology starts with a camera: a gate arm that logs entries, a doorbell style panel at the lobby door, a keypad that photographs whoever punches in the code. Recording silent video of a common area is generally the more permissive of the two questions. Many newer devices bundle a microphone into the same unit as the camera, and installers often leave audio turned on by default because it makes the recording more useful to them. That default is the trap for a board: approving the camera does not automatically approve the microphone.
Some states require everyone's consent to record audio
In a number of states, the law requires every person in a conversation to consent before it can lawfully be recorded, not just the person or association operating the device. One tracker of state wiretapping law puts the current count at twelve states.
"The 12 all-party consent states are: California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, Nevada (wire communications), New Hampshire, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington."
Source: Two-Party Consent States for Recording, RecordingLaw.com
That list comes from a single secondary tracker of state law, not a statute the association can cite directly. Whether your state requires all-party consent, and whether that rule applies to a gate intercom the way it applies to a phone call, is a question to confirm against your state's current wiretapping statute before anyone turns on the microphone.
Before you turn on the microphone
Treat audio as its own decision every time, not a checkbox that comes free with a camera upgrade. Before enabling audio recording on a gate intercom, video doorbell style entry system, or any similar access control device: confirm what your state's current consent law actually requires, ask the vendor whether audio can be switched off while video stays on, and get that answer in writing rather than trusting the installer's factory defaults. If the board already approved cameras at the gate, that approval does not stretch to cover a later firmware update or vendor swap that quietly adds a microphone.
Check yourself
Answer before you read the explanation, recalling it is what makes it stick.
Your gate vendor enables audio recording by default on the new video intercom. What should the board do first?
How does an all-party consent state differ from other states on recording conversations?
A board wants to record audio on lobby intercoms. Which statement is accurate?
Sources
- Two-Party Consent States for Recording, RecordingLaw.com
Technology
Setting up a website or portal alongside your access control system? See how the same technology hierarchy applies to association websites.
Whether your state requires all-party consent to record audio, and whether that rule applies to a gate intercom or lobby panel, varies by state and should be confirmed against current law before enabling any device's microphone.