Recording Law for Phone & Video Calls in New York

In New York, you can record any phone call, video call (Zoom, FaceTime, Teams, etc.), or other conversation you are part of without telling the other person. This is because New York is a one-party consent state under Penal Law §250.00. The law defines wiretapping and eavesdropping offenses and sets penalties in Penal Law §250.05, which makes a violation a Class E felony. The statute covers telephone calls, electronic communications, and in-person talks, so the rule applies the same whether you’re on a phone call, a video meeting, or talking in person. The key point: if you’re part of the conversation, you don’t have to tell anyone you’re recording.

New York’s wiretapping and eavesdropping law is found in Penal Law §250.00. Section 250.00(1) covers wiretapping telephone or telegraphic calls, defining the offense as recording 'by a person other than a sender or receiver thereof, without the consent of either the sender or receiver, by means of any instrument, device or equipment.' Section 250.00(2) covers mechanical overhearing of conversations, defining the offense as recording 'without the consent of at least one party thereto, by a person not present thereat, by means of any instrument, device or equipment.' Both sections make clear that a party to the conversation is not covered by the law because a participant is 'present' at the conversation. New York courts have also addressed the concept of 'presence' in McLaughlin v. McLaughlin (4th Dep’t 2013), which held that a family member recording a conversation from another room in the same residence was treated as 'present' for the purpose of the statute. So, for anyone actually in the conversation, no consent is needed at all. Separately, Penal Law §250.00(6) reaches 'intercepting or accessing of an electronic communication' by a person who is not the sender or intended receiver and without the consent of the sender or intended receiver; this provision is not aural-only because §250.00(5) defines 'electronic communication' to include 'any transfer of signs, signals, writing, images, sounds, data, or intelligence,' expressly including images. A narrow edge case arises if smartglasses silently intercept someone else’s already-existing electronic video transmission (for example, a live video call), in which event §250.00(6) could apply even without audio.

If you’re only recording video without capturing any audio, New York law generally doesn’t restrict that. The wiretapping and eavesdropping statutes focus on conversations and communications with an aural element. Penal Law §250.00(1) only covers telephone or telegraphic communications, which are defined as 'aural transfer' over wire or cable. Section 250.00(2) covers conversations or discussions, which are inherently verbal exchanges. So, filming a scene without recording sound does not violate these provisions. However, New York does have separate laws against surreptitious recording of people in private places for improper purposes, such as undressing or sexual conduct under Penal Law §§250.40–250.65. Those laws don’t apply to ordinary video recording in public or in your own home. A distinct, narrow edge case exists if smartglasses silently intercept someone else’s already-existing electronic video transmission (for example, a live video call); in that scenario, Penal Law §250.00(6) could apply even without audio because §250.00(5) defines 'electronic communication' to include 'images,' but this is not the ordinary ambient-capture use case.

New York has a law called the New Yorker’s Right to Monitor Act (N.Y. Civil Rights Law §79-p), signed June 14, 2020 and effective July 14, 2020, that protects your right to record law enforcement officers performing their duties in public. This law allows you to record police activity and keep control of the recording, and it creates a civil action if someone interferes. However, a New York court recently ruled in Reyes v. City of New York, 2026 NY Slip Op 03914 (Docket No. 59, decided June 23, 2026), that this protection does not extend to recording inside a police stationhouse or its lobby, even if the area is publicly accessible. So, recording police on the street is protected, but recording inside a station is not. This is a narrow exception, and it only applies to law enforcement activity in specific locations.

New York City has a local law about biometric data that includes voiceprints. If a 'commercial establishment' in NYC collects, retains, converts, stores, or shares a customer’s voiceprint, it must post a clear sign near all customer entrances telling customers that their voiceprints are being collected. The law does not require written consent, just a sign. It also bans selling or profiting from biometric data. This rule only applies to brick-and-mortar retail, food, or entertainment venues collecting biometrics from customers at physical entrances, not to regular phone or video calls between individuals. So, if you’re recording a call for personal use, this law doesn’t change anything. It only matters if a business is collecting voiceprints from customers in a physical location.

New York has no special rule that changes the one-party consent outcome for a wearer recording their own conversation at home. Because a participant 'present' at a conversation is entirely outside the 'mechanical overhearing' definition under Penal Law §250.00(2), a wearer recording their own conversation is equally unrestricted at home or in public. Separately, New York recognizes a 'vicarious consent' doctrine, adopted from federal case law, that allows a parent or guardian to consent on behalf of a minor child to recording the child’s conversations where the parent has a good faith, objectively reasonable basis to believe it is necessary for the child’s welfare. This doctrine applies only when a parent or guardian is acting on behalf of a minor child and is a status-based consent substitute, not a location-based rule.

Imagine you’re on a Zoom call with a coworker to discuss a project. You want to record the call so you can review the details later. In New York, you can do this without telling your coworker. Because you’re a party to the conversation, New York’s one-party consent rule means you don’t need their permission. The same applies to a phone call with a friend or a FaceTime call with family. Just remember: if you share the recording publicly, you could face other legal issues like invasion of privacy, but the recording itself is legal under New York’s wiretapping law.

New York courts have read a reasonable-expectation-of-privacy gloss into the 'conversation' element of Penal Law §250.00(2), holding that individuals who talk in a manner such that a non-participating third party may freely overhear the conversation have no reasonable expectation of privacy in it. This means a sufficiently open or loud public conversation may fall outside the protected 'conversation' concept altogether, letting a bystander record it without any party’s consent. This gloss is derived from Appellate Division decisions such as People v. Kirsh (1st Dep’t 1991) and McLaughlin v. McLaughlin (4th Dep’t 2013), though the precise contours remain subject to interpretation and have not been independently verified against the full primary opinions. For the wearer as a first-person participant, no consent is needed anywhere—public or private—under the plain 'not present thereat' language of §250.00(2), independent of any reasonable-expectation-of-privacy gloss.