Recording Law for Family Law in Georgia

Georgia follows a one-party consent rule for audio recordings. That means you can legally record a conversation, phone call, or video chat if you are one of the people talking. The law doesn’t care whether the other person knows they’re being recorded. This rule comes from O.C.G.A. § 16-11-66(a), which states: 'Nothing in Code Section 16-11-62 shall prohibit a person from intercepting a wire, oral, or electronic communication where such person is a party to the communication or one of the parties to the communication has given prior consent to such interception.' So if you’re in the room, on the call, or in the chat, you’re allowed to record the audio without telling the other person. This applies to in-person talks, phone calls, and online meetings. The key is that you must actually be part of the conversation—you can’t secretly record someone else’s private talk you’re not part of.

Georgia treats video recording differently. If you film someone’s activities in a private place—like their home, a backyard, or a private office—you must get consent from everyone being filmed. O.C.G.A. § 16-11-62(2) makes it illegal 'without the consent of all persons observed, to observe, photograph, or record the activities of another which occur in any private place and out of public view.' This rule covers silent video too, even if you don’t record sound. The law defines a “private place” as a place where there is a reasonable expectation of privacy, per O.C.G.A. § 16-11-60(3). So if you’re filming inside someone else’s house, their private yard, or a back room at work, you generally need everyone’s permission to record. This is stricter than the one-party rule for audio.

There’s a special rule for your own home. Georgia allows you to use a device to observe, photograph, or record activities that happen on your property without getting everyone’s consent. This exception applies only to your own home or the area immediately around it (called the curtilage). It also covers people who live there, own the home, subscribe to the security system, or are family members of the owner or resident. The history of this exception is important: it was originally enacted in 2000 via two conflicting bills (House Bill 1576 and Senate Bill 316), invalidated by the Georgia Supreme Court in Rutter v. Rutter, 294 Ga. 1, 749 S.E.2d 657 (2013), because the two enactments were irreconcilably inconsistent, and only restored by the 2022 SB 539 amendment, which added language to O.C.G.A. § 16-11-62(2)(C). But this exception only applies to recording activities—it doesn’t let you secretly record private conversations happening in your home. For conversations, the one-party consent rule still applies, meaning you can record yourself, but not others’ private talks without their knowledge.

If you record in a public place—like a street, park, or store aisle—Georgia’s wiretapping law doesn’t apply at all. O.C.G.A. § 16-11-62 only covers conduct in a “private place” out of public view. A Georgia appeals court made this clear in Gary v. State, 338 Ga. App. 403, 790 S.E.2d 150 (2016), where it reversed a conviction for secretly filming someone in a publicly accessible grocery store. Beyond state law, the federal First Amendment protects your right to record police officers performing their duties in public. The Eleventh Circuit, which covers Georgia, recognized this right in Smith v. City of Cumming, 212 F.3d 1332 (11th Cir. 2000). However, officers may still interfere or seize your device without facing civil liability due to qualified immunity, as shown in later cases like Crocker v. Beatty, 995 F.3d 1232 (11th Cir. 2021). So while you have the right to record in public, be prepared for potential pushback from law enforcement.

Recording someone without their consent in a way that violates Georgia’s wiretapping law is a felony under O.C.G.A. § 16-11-69, which provides for a penalty of 1 to 5 years in prison, a fine of up to $10,000, or both. Georgia’s civil remedies for illegal recording primarily arise from common-law invasion-of-privacy torts such as Pavesich v. New England Life Ins. Co., 122 Ga. 190 (1905), rather than from an express statutory private right of action within the wiretapping statute itself. Even if you think you’re recording for a good reason—like documenting abuse or custody issues—if you violate the consent rules, the recording may still be used as evidence in court and you could face criminal charges. Georgia courts have also made clear that secretly recorded conversations or videos can be used to support claims like invasion of privacy depending on context. So before you record, make sure you’re following the law—otherwise, you could do more harm than good to your case.

Imagine you’re picking up your child from your ex’s home for a scheduled visit. You’re standing outside on the driveway when your ex comes out and starts yelling at you in front of the kids. You pull out your phone and start recording the conversation. In this situation, you’re in a public area (a driveway outside a home is generally accessible to visitors), so Georgia’s wiretapping law doesn’t apply. You can record the audio and video without consent because it’s happening in a place where there’s no reasonable expectation of privacy and it’s not a private conversation. If the argument moves inside the house, though, recording the conversation without consent would violate the one-party consent rule for audio, and recording the activities without everyone’s consent would violate the all-party rule for video. If you record inside without consent, the recording could be used as evidence in court and you could face criminal charges.

Georgia’s wiretapping statute hinges on whether a conversation or activity occurs in a 'private place,' a term defined in O.C.G.A. § 16-11-60(3) as 'a place where there is a reasonable expectation of privacy.' This definition is the gatekeeper for both the one-party audio rule and the all-party video rule. Courts apply this standard directly: in Gary v. State, 338 Ga. App. 403, 790 S.E.2d 150 (2016), the Georgia Court of Appeals held that § 16-11-62(2) does not criminalize filming in a publicly accessible grocery store because it is not a private place. The court’s analysis focuses on the physical location’s reasonable expectation of privacy, not on factors like volume, audience, or subject matter. This means a backyard, a fenced yard, a home office, or a business’s back room can qualify as a private place, while a street, a parking lot, or a store aisle generally does not.

Georgia has no state law that restricts your ability to record on-duty police officers performing their duties in public view. Because O.C.G.A. § 16-11-62 only reaches conduct in a 'private place... out of public view,' recording police performing duties in public view falls outside the statute altogether. On top of that statutory gap, the Eleventh Circuit—whose rulings bind Georgia—has recognized a First Amendment right to record police in public. In Smith v. City of Cumming, 212 F.3d 1332 (11th Cir. 2000), the court held that 'The First Amendment protects the right to gather information about what public officials do on public property, and specifically, a right to record matters of public interest,' including police conduct, subject to reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions. However, the Eleventh Circuit later narrowed the practical force of Smith in Crocker v. Beatty, 995 F.3d 1232 (11th Cir. 2021), holding that a deputy who seized a bystander’s phone after he photographed a crash scene was entitled to qualified immunity because Smith’s right-to-record holding 'came without much explanation' and did not give officers fair warning of the right’s precise contours. So while Smith establishes the abstract First Amendment right to record police in public, individual officers who interfere with or retaliate against recording frequently escape civil damages liability via qualified immunity.