Drones, Real Estate Video Surveillance, and Neighbourhood Right to Privacy – The Potential Area of Normative Impact from the Perspective of the Polish Law

Abstract

The use of new technologies covers more and more areas of social life, including securing and protecting property, especially real estate. For these purposes cameras mounted on drones may be used, allowing the possibility to record vidoes containing an overview of the monitored property (real estate). However, this type of property protection may also be connected with the violation of rights of neighboring property owners which are monitored indirectly. These issues are presented in this paper, where the author discusses, inter alia, what risks are associated with the implementation of neighborhood video surveillance done with drones and its consequences. Based on the indicated research area, the author wonders in particular on the provisions of the constitutional right to privacy and personal rights defined in the private law legislation, including its international dimension connected with ECHR and GDPR. The presentation containes observations made from the point of view of the Polish law, where—as in many other legal jurisdictions—these issues have not yet been resolved legislatively, and where the search for an optimal model for resolving similar problems is still underway. For this reason, the author tries to outline the potential area of normative impact of the phenomenon of real estate monitoring by drones, which may become helpful in the forthcoming legislative projects concerning the normalization of this phenomenon.