Camera surveillance by housing or owners’ association
Under certain conditions, the housing association or owners’ association may, if necessary, install a security camera in your building to protect property and residents. But the infringement of your privacy must be as minor as possible.
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By recording with a surveillance camera, the housing association or owners’ association processes personal data of residents and visitors to your building. Processing personal data is only permitted if there is a good reason for doing so.
The privacy law, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), lists the six reasons. The legal name for those reasons are legal bases. The housing association or owners’ association needs a legal basis for being allowed to process personal data.
Legal basis legitimate interest
For camera surveillance, the housing association or owners’ association may be able to use the legal basis “necessary for the pursuit of a legitimate interest”. But in that case, the housing association or owners’ association will have to meet all conditions for a legitimate interest. This is a legal check based on the GDPR. Those conditions are:
- The housing association or owners’ association actually has a legitimate interest. Such as protecting property or people, for example, because the building is frequently broken into.
- Camera surveillance is necessary. Necessity consists of two requirements.
Firstly, the purpose of the camera surveillance must be proportionate to the invasion of the privacy of the data subjects.
Secondly, the housing association or owners’ association must find out whether there is another option to achieve the goal that is less intrusive for privacy. - The housing association or owners’ association has weighed up the importance of camera surveillance and the privacy interests of the people being recorded.
Other GDPR requirements
Does the housing association or owners’ association meet the conditions for the legal basis of legitimate interest? Then the following requirements from the GDPR also apply.
Duty to provide information about camera surveillance
The housing association or owners’ association must ensure that everyone knows camera surveillance is in place. For example, by putting up signs.
No permission to record everything
The cameras are not allowed to record inside people’s homes. The same applies for recording public property, unless this is unavoidable. Only in that case may the camera capture buildings, sites and property belonging to others or public roads.
The housing association or owners’ association must consider whether it is necessary to record the public space. Is it necessary? Then the camera may not record more than is necessary to protect the property and residents.
Retention period of camera images
The housing association or owners’ association may not retain the camera images for longer than necessary. But if a camera has captured a criminal offence such as theft, the housing association or owners’ association may retain the relevant images until this has been resolved.