Shooting video in LHR T5 Border Control
Apr 16, 2018, 12:10 pm
#61
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: All over the place often South Wales and Lake District
Programs: BA Gold for Life Accor Platinum
Posts: 4,552
As a photographer I would disagree. Police do not have the authority to require you to do any such thing. They don't have the right to control the media that you are recording in, be it audio, still or video. The airport can refuse permission for photography/video just as any landowner can for any reason within their property. Commercial or private. But they can only tell you to stop or evict you from the building if you refuse to do so.
Apr 16, 2018, 12:20 pm
#62
Ambassador, British Airways; FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Leeds, UK
Programs: BA GGL/CCR, GfL, HH Diamond
Posts: 42,945
As a photographer I would disagree. Police do not have the authority to require you to do any such thing. They don't have the right to control the media that you are recording in, be it audio, still or video. The airport can refuse permission for photography/video just as any landowner can for any reason within their property. Commercial or private. But they can only tell you to stop or evict you from the building if you refuse to do so.
https://www.met.police.uk/advice-and...graphy-advice/
Viewing and seizure is well within their powers albeit subject to the criteria noted. Deletion isn’t immediately within their powers but possible with a subsequent court order.
Apr 16, 2018, 12:27 pm
#63
Join Date: Sep 2014
Location: London
Programs: BAEC Gold
Posts: 561
Apr 16, 2018, 12:31 pm
#64
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: All over the place often South Wales and Lake District
Programs: BA Gold for Life Accor Platinum
Posts: 4,552
There are non criminal issues - i.e. an airport or any landowner requiring you to get permission to film on their property, and criminal issues which the police enforce. In terms of their powers to view images, seize equipment, and delete this is informative
https://www.met.police.uk/advice-and...graphy-advice/
Viewing and seizure is well within their powers albeit subject to the criteria noted. Deletion isn’t immediately within their powers but possible with a subsequent court order.
It was the deletion I was referring to. They can't summarily tell you to delete anything and have to have grounds for seizure. There was a huge backlash to the 'terror' laws from photographers and in the end there was an amendment made to clarify photographers' rights.
Signs or no signs though, I wouldn't take photos or videos in any area that is considered security related, so security and passport control. I have taken the odd photo with my phone in the baggage hall.
Apr 16, 2018, 2:45 pm
#65
Join Date: May 2017
Programs: SPG, MR, WOH, HH, IHG
Posts: 43
Back in the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries lots of people would also really have believed that there was a legitimate reason to worry about foreign spies taking pictures of bridges, churches in the Kremlin and so on. In the west we have always had a laugh about this as we know it was just paranoia and simply not true. And I suspect that the same is true these days with airport "security". I believe that in the future we will laugh at the paranoia around today. 
Apr 16, 2018, 2:49 pm
#66
Join Date: Mar 2018
Programs: BA Silver
Posts: 34
I must admit to being one of those that has photographed a long queue at Immigration with no eGates open and tweeted it. I get that the eGates are manned and that staffing a late night flight can be problematic; I don’t get too worked up as the EU manual line tends to go reasonably quickly. My bigger issue is when they don’t sort out the Tensa barriers and you end up with the queue backing up to the escalators. On two occasions when I’ve been going through it’s caused a commotion at the top of the escalators, which is going to cause a serious accident one day.
One question: why when manning an eGate a border force agent can process several at a time, do they instead opt to put 3 or 4 on the manual line? Given the large majority of EU passengers will use the eGate, I’d have thought that would make sense. Do border agents need to be specially trained on eGates?
One question: why when manning an eGate a border force agent can process several at a time, do they instead opt to put 3 or 4 on the manual line? Given the large majority of EU passengers will use the eGate, I’d have thought that would make sense. Do border agents need to be specially trained on eGates?
Apr 16, 2018, 3:13 pm
#68
Join Date: Apr 2002
Location: NYC
Posts: 9,120
There are non criminal issues - i.e. an airport or any landowner requiring you to get permission to film on their property, and criminal issues which the police enforce. In terms of their powers to view images, seize equipment, and delete this is informative
https://www.met.police.uk/advice-and...graphy-advice/
Viewing and seizure is well within their powers albeit subject to the criteria noted. Deletion isn’t immediately within their powers but possible with a subsequent court order.
Apr 16, 2018, 3:14 pm
#69
Join Date: Mar 2018
Programs: BA Silver
Posts: 34
...and was used on the first occasion. Second occasion after a short scrum the passengers parted like the Red Sea, giving a HAL employee enough time to herd the queue.
Apr 16, 2018, 3:25 pm
#70
FlyerTalk Evangelist, Ambassador, British Airways Executive Club
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Somewhere between 0 and 13,000 metres high
Programs: AF/KL Life Plat, BA GGL+GfL, ALL Plat, Hilton Diam, Marriott Gold, blablablah, etc
Posts: 30,520
As it happens, there have been many terror attacks carried out in Europe in recent years, and yes, photographs of the places they attacked were reported to be found when terrorists' houses were then searched multiple times, and of course, around the world, strategic targets such as check points have been the object of extremely regular terror attacks not least in Iraq and Afghanistan. Unless one chooses not to dismiss it out of principle, I'd say that is already plenty of evidence. And that is only to focus on what makes it to the general public, ie successful attacks, because by nature, any intelligence on attacks that are successfully prevented (a vast majority of intended ones thankfully) is withheld from the public, but it would make it quite extraordinary if the cases we hear about accounted for all the attempts by ill-intended people to capture images and data on the places they want to attack.
Apr 16, 2018, 3:45 pm
#71
Join Date: Jun 2015
Location: LHR, LGW
Programs: BAEC
Posts: 3,427
Apr 16, 2018, 5:19 pm
#72
Join Date: Jan 2018
Location: Glasgow, UK
Programs: BA Gold
Posts: 622
I must admit that until now I didn’t realise it wasn’t allowed to take photos/video in a UK immigration hall (although it certainly makes sense...not that I have ever tried). I haven’t noticed (m)any signs to that effect, or seen any vigorous enforcement. Is the prohibition on photography in particular? Or, similar to the USA, mobile phones/devices more broadly?
This is something the US seem much clearer on. Plenty of signs on the walk to immigration, as well as in the hall itself. And visible enforcement that the punters are complying with the rules.
Newark, in particular, seemed pretty hot in this regard on my last visit there in September. The man in front of me was asked by a “red jacket” multiple times, in no uncertain terms, to put his phone away. Each time she left, he would bring the phone back out. We got quite close to the front of the queue when she announced that enough was enough, invited the gentleman in question to step out of the line to have a chat with a supervisor, after which he was unceremoniously plopped at the back of the queue the which had since swelled with several wide-bodies worth of people. I thought that was pretty harsh, but unlikely to be a lesson he’d forget.
And one I haven’t either. Post-flight emails/texts are handled when waiting to disembark, then the phone is put away until after customs/immigration.
This is something the US seem much clearer on. Plenty of signs on the walk to immigration, as well as in the hall itself. And visible enforcement that the punters are complying with the rules.
Newark, in particular, seemed pretty hot in this regard on my last visit there in September. The man in front of me was asked by a “red jacket” multiple times, in no uncertain terms, to put his phone away. Each time she left, he would bring the phone back out. We got quite close to the front of the queue when she announced that enough was enough, invited the gentleman in question to step out of the line to have a chat with a supervisor, after which he was unceremoniously plopped at the back of the queue the which had since swelled with several wide-bodies worth of people. I thought that was pretty harsh, but unlikely to be a lesson he’d forget.
And one I haven’t either. Post-flight emails/texts are handled when waiting to disembark, then the phone is put away until after customs/immigration.
Apr 16, 2018, 5:59 pm
#73
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Argentina
Posts: 40,209
I once arrived early for my flight at CPH so decided to cycle along the coast road and have a picnic beside the sea. Just so happened the approach to the runway was there so I started snapping a few pics of the landing aircraft. Not long after a security vehicle pulled up and told me to stop taking photographs. So I did.
Apr 16, 2018, 7:22 pm
#74
Join Date: Aug 2012
Location: VPS
Programs: IHG Diamond, Delta PM, Hilton Gold, Accor Gold, Marriott Silver
Posts: 7,265
I do think we're better over here on idiot-proofing and providing signs for travel instructions in general- here's the sign explaining to go left for Concourse Q and that concourse X is ahead to the right. Lots of public restrooms right over there. Next gas station is 220 miles away so fuel up now. Do not feed bears. Do not feed alligators. Beach closed to imminent hurricane. Agricultural inspection ahead; all moving vans stop there. No food or services on other side of checkpoint....
Apr 16, 2018, 9:44 pm
#75
Join Date: Jun 2017
Location: MidSouth
Programs: AA; Delta GM
Posts: 728
And then ICE itself has started to push US citizens to download the Mobile border app for their phone and use it at participating points of entry in the name of getting low risk/low interest arrivals processed through the rat's maze quicker. So there's a fading of what used to be hard and fast 'no phones' rule in some places.