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  1. Harms of Spy-Cam Filming

Harms of Spy-Cam Filming

Harms of spy-cam filming arise in both commercial and non-commercial contexts. In today’s Internet age, non-commercially filmed spy-cam footage can easily be uploaded to pornographic websites and turned into commercial material. In an incident reported in July 2019, for example, a 30-year-old Osaka man filmed sex acts with a woman he met online, and uploaded more than 200 clips to a site online from 2013 to earn revenues of around eight-hundred thousand dollars (Kobe Shimbun, 2019). There is little reason to differentiate between the two kinds of secretly filmed footage, and so we discuss them in combination here.

So-called “spy-cam filming” is a significant genre of commercial pornography. When we search products listed on Amazon Japan’s site using the keyword tousatsu (spy-cam filming), the number of hits is more than 10,000 (as of December 2020). Because the number of hits produces more than 10,000 results, no higher number can be displayed, so the real number of products on sale is unclear. When researching them in August 2010, the number was no more than 7,000. For comparison, when searching the keyword chikan (sexual groping), more than 6,000 hits arise; when searching the keyword rape, there are more than 9,000 hits. These comparisons show how big the market for “spy-cam filming”is in Japan. Many people believe these videos are fake, but they are wrong. As we know from an old newspaper report from 2002, a manager of a pornography production company who was arrested for organizing a female gang of spy-cam filmers to produce and sell many spy-cam videos said in a deposition that around 40% of “spy-cam filming” circulating in the commercial market was “fake,” but the rest was authentic. “When connoisseurs watch them, they discern the authenticity of them. So, we had to run the risk of secretly filming,” he said (Tokyo Shimbun, 2002).

While spy-cam filmed pornography is a significant genre of the commercial pornography market, it is also produced in large volume to gratify individual perpetrators. The miniaturization and sophistication of spy cameras now allow anyone to secretly film anywhere—changing rooms, public bathhouses, public toilets, motel rooms, private rooms, on the street, in schools, in the workplace, and on public transport. A complete stranger can secretly put a spy-cam in a public place like a toilet or changing room, and a partner, brother, or any other family member can secretly film or photograph a victim’s naked or semi-naked body while bathing or changing clothes in the home. Further, a sex-buyer can order a woman for prostitution through an escort agency and secretly film her body or sex acts. Among recently reported incidents in the Japanese media, in December 2019 a man in his 40s ordered an outcall escort prostituted women to come to his house where he filmed her in sex acts (Kobe Shimbun, 2019). Another incident reported in June 2008 involved a man in his 30s having installed spy cameras within the walls of women’s toilets in a public park and secretly filmed mainly junior-high or high school girls for seven years. Police confiscated hundreds of SD cards and DVDs from his house. In this incident alone, the number of the victims seemed to have amounted to several hundred (Kyoto Shimbun, 2018). Because Japan doesn’t have national legislation against spy-cam filming, police clamp down on the crime as a nuisance act in public spaces under local nuisance prevention ordinances. There is no law requiring deleting materials shot by spy cams, so advocates are now campaigning in Japan for a criminal law against spy-cam crimes (see Bengoshi dot.com News, 2018; Mainichi Shimbun, 2018).

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