Recording Law for Streamers & Creators in Maryland

Maryland's Wiretap Act generally requires all parties to consent before you may record a conversation. The law treats three categories of communications differently: wire communications (such as phone calls), electronic communications (such as text messages or emails), and oral communications (in-person speech). Wire and electronic communications are protected regardless of whether the speakers have a reasonable expectation of privacy, so you need everyone's consent to record those. Oral communications are protected only if they qualify as a "private conversation" under Maryland's statute. Maryland's §10-401(13)(i) defines an "oral communication" as "any conversation or words spoken to or by any person in private conversation," and the undefined phrase "private conversation" is filled in by Maryland courts using the two-part Katz reasonable-expectation-of-privacy test: did the speaker have a subjective expectation of privacy, and would society recognize that expectation as reasonable? If the conversation qualifies as a private oral communication, you need everyone's consent to record it. If it does not qualify—because the speaker's words were exposed to the public or spoken loudly enough to be overheard by unintended listeners—the all-party consent rule does not apply. The statute does not contain a bright-line public-place exception, so the Katz test applies to in-person speech regardless of where it occurs. Location alone is not dispositive; courts look at whether the speaker's words were exposed to the public or whether the speaker took steps to seclude the conversation. In Malpas v. State, 116 Md. App. 69, 695 A.2d 588 (Md. Ct. Spec. App. 1997), a third party's loud statements made in his own apartment and audible through a shared wall were held not to be a protected "oral communication" because they were "the functional equivalent of statements knowingly exposed to the public."

You can record in public without consent when the in-person conversation is not a protected "private conversation" under Maryland's Wiretap Act. For example, if you are livestreaming on a busy sidewalk and people are speaking at a volume audible to passersby, that speech is typically not private because it is exposed to the public. The same is true for a loud argument in a park or a conversation on a public transit platform where the speakers' words carry to bystanders. Maryland courts apply the Katz two-prong reasonable-expectation-of-privacy test to decide whether a given in-person conversation is a protected "oral communication." Conversations conducted in public, in a loud voice, or otherwise observable or audible to third parties generally fall outside the statute's protection, meaning no all-party consent is legally required to record them. Electronic communications (such as text messages or emails) and wire communications (such as phone calls) are protected regardless of a case-by-case REOP showing, so the all-party consent rule applies to those categories per se.

The Wiretap Act restricts only the interception of statutorily defined communications—"wire, oral, or electronic communication"—as those terms are defined in §10-401. The Act's prohibitions do not reach video-only recordings because the statute's definitions require aural or spoken content or transmission via a communications system. If your camera is running but the microphone is off, or if the audio is inaudible, Maryland's Wiretap Act does not apply. This means you can film people, buildings, or events in public without worrying about the Wiretap Act, as long as you are not recording private conversations. The moment you turn on the microphone and capture someone's words, the all-party consent rule applies if the conversation is private. If you are streaming and the audio is live, you are recording an oral communication and must follow the consent rules unless the conversation is not private.

Recording a private conversation without everyone's consent can expose you to serious penalties in Maryland. The Wiretap Act makes it unlawful to intercept a wire, oral, or electronic communication unless all parties have given prior consent. For wire communications and certain aggravated violations involving oral or electronic communications, this is a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine. Other violations may be treated as misdemeanors with lesser penalties. There is also a private right of action: the person you recorded can sue you for up to $1,000 per day of violation, plus attorney fees and punitive damages. These penalties apply even if you did not intend to break the law or thought the conversation was not private. The law does not distinguish between sharing a recording and keeping it for yourself. If you are unsure whether a conversation is private, it is safer to ask for consent or avoid recording the audio.

Imagine you are livestreaming a protest on Charles Street in Baltimore. The crowd is loud, and people are chanting slogans at a volume audible to passersby. You are holding your phone in front of you, microphone on. Because the speech is public and audible to anyone nearby, it is not a private conversation under Maryland law. You do not need to ask everyone on camera for consent. Now imagine the same protest, but a small group of organizers steps into a recessed doorway to plan their next move. They are speaking quietly, and their voices do not carry to the sidewalk. In this case, their conversation is private, and Maryland's all-party consent rule applies. If you keep recording the audio, you are violating the Wiretap Act unless you have everyone's consent.

Recording police officers while they perform public duties in public places is generally permitted in Maryland, but the governing rule is not a bright-line public-place exception. Maryland has no statutory exception permitting citizens to record on-duty officers without consent as such; instead, case law holds that officers conducting their public duties—such as a traffic stop on a public highway—generally lack a reasonable expectation of privacy in their on-the-job statements, so the encounter falls outside the definition of a protected "oral communication" altogether. The leading trial-court authority is State v. Graber, a Harford County Circuit Court decision from 2010, in which the court dismissed wiretap felony charges against a motorcyclist who helmet-cam-recorded a plainclothes state trooper during a traffic stop, holding that the trooper did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the conversation. However, Graber is an unreported, trial-court-level decision with no appellate ratification, so it should be treated as strong persuasive authority, not binding precedent. Separately, on the federal constitutional side, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (which includes Maryland) has recognized a First Amendment right to record or livestream police performing their duties in public: in Sharpe v. Winterville Police Dep't, 59 F.4th 674 (4th Cir. 2023), the court held that livestreaming a police traffic stop is speech protected by the First Amendment, though it affirmed qualified immunity for the individual officers because the specific right to livestream was not yet "clearly established" at the time of that incident. If an officer tells you to stop recording, ask whether they are issuing a lawful order or expressing a personal preference. If it is a lawful order, comply. If not, you have a First Amendment right to continue recording in public.