Recording Law for Recording in Public in Arizona

Arizona is a one-party consent state. That means you can record any conversation you are part of without telling the other person or people. The rule comes from Arizona’s wiretap law, A.R.S. § 13-3005 (Interception of wire, electronic and oral communications; installation of pen register or trap and trace device; classification; exceptions). It covers in-person talks, phone calls, and electronic messages. The key exemption is in A.R.S. § 13-3012(9): recording is allowed if you are a participant or are present during the conversation. The law does not add extra rules for public places—so recording in parks, sidewalks, or stores follows the same one-party rule. However, there is an important distinction: Arizona’s definition of “oral communication” at A.R.S. § 13-3001(8) requires a reasonable expectation of privacy that the communication is not subject to interception under circumstances justifying the expectation, while wire and electronic communications are protected regardless of any privacy expectation.

Arizona’s law only protects conversations where the speaker has a reasonable expectation the talk won’t be intercepted. That test is written into the definition of “oral communication” at A.R.S. § 13-3001(8): a spoken communication that is uttered by a person who exhibits an expectation that the communication is not subject to interception under circumstances justifying the expectation. A loud argument on a city sidewalk usually lacks that expectation, but a hushed conversation in a crowded café might still carry it. Courts look at the facts: volume, distance, body language, and whether anyone asked to keep the talk private. In State v. Hauss, 142 Ariz. 159, 688 P.2d 1051 (Ariz. Ct. App. 1984), the court said no violation occurred when police recorded a suspect talking to his girlfriend in an interrogation room because the pair had no reasonable expectation of privacy there.

Arizona has no law that makes it a crime to record on-duty police officers performing their jobs in public. A 2022 state law that banned filming police within eight feet after a warning was preliminarily enjoined as facially unconstitutional by a federal district court in September 2022 and later permanently enjoined in July 2023 following a settlement by the Attorney General, so it cannot be enforced. The Ninth Circuit, which covers Arizona, has recognized a First Amendment right to record police in public: Fordyce v. City of Seattle, 55 F.3d 436 (9th Cir. 1995); Askins v. U.S. Dep’t of Homeland Security, 899 F.3d 1035, 1044 (9th Cir. 2018) (right to record extends to law enforcement officers in public places, subject to reasonable time/place/manner restrictions). If you are part of the interaction, the one-party consent rule also covers any audio you capture.

Silent video recording in public is unrestricted under Arizona’s wiretap law. The statute targets interception of “aural or other acquisition of the contents of any wire, electronic or oral communication.” Video without audio does not fall under that definition. Separate voyeurism rules in A.R.S. § 13-3019 only apply to hidden or surreptitious recordings of nudity or sexual activity in private places, so they do not limit open video of public disputes or police interactions.

Arizona’s one-party consent rule applies inside your own home just as it does in public. There is no special stricter or more lenient rule for recording inside a residence. The only location-specific privacy restriction in Arizona law is A.R.S. § 13-3019, which criminalizes surreptitious or hidden photographing or videotaping of a person in a restroom, bathroom, locker room, bedroom, or other place where they have a reasonable expectation of privacy while nude, dressing/undressing, or engaged in sexual activity, or footage that captures genitalia/buttocks/female breast not otherwise visible to the public. This statute is aimed at hidden recording of private bodily exposure, not at open wearable-device recording of disputes or interactions with others in a person’s own home.

Recording a conversation without the required consent can be a felony under A.R.S. § 13-3005. The penalty is a class 5 felony for unlawful interception of wire, electronic, or oral communications under subsection A, and a class 6 felony for unlawful installation of a pen register or trap and trace device under subsection B. There is also a civil cause of action under A.R.S. § 12-731 that lets someone sue for actual damages, $100 per day or $10,000 in statutory damages (whichever is greater), punitive damages, and reasonable attorney fees. The statute of limitations is one year from the date the plaintiff knew or should have known of the violation.

Imagine you are at a public park and two people start shouting at each other. They are standing in the open, voices raised so everyone nearby can hear. You use your phone to record the exchange. Because the speakers are in a public place and are not taking steps to keep the conversation private, they have no reasonable expectation the talk won’t be overheard or recorded. Under Arizona’s one-party consent rule, you can record without their knowledge. If the argument were hushed and the speakers leaned in close, a court might see a reasonable expectation of privacy and the recording could be treated differently.

Arizona does not have a statutory carve-out that permits or restricts citizens from recording on-duty police officers during traffic stops or other encounters. Because the recording person is present during the interaction, their own presence satisfies the one-party consent exemption for audio under A.R.S. § 13-3012(9). Video-only recording is not covered by the wiretap statute at all, as it does not involve interception of a communication. The now-invalid HB2319 attempted to restrict recording within eight feet of police activity, but it was preliminarily enjoined in September 2022 and permanently enjoined in July 2023, leaving no enforceable distance restriction. The Ninth Circuit has recognized a First Amendment right to record police performing official duties in public: Fordyce v. City of Seattle, 55 F.3d 436 (9th Cir. 1995); Askins v. U.S. Dep’t of Homeland Security, 899 F.3d 1035, 1044 (9th Cir. 2018).