Catching Them Cheating: What is Fair Game?
In today’s massively tech-enabled world, it seems like it would be trivially easy to find proof that your spouse is cheating on you — and, in fact, it is trivially easy. Anyone willing to spend a hundred bucks can purchase a motion-activated camera, a device that snaps into your landline and records everything, and much more. The problem isn’t that you can’t do it — it’s that it’s (mostly) illegal to do it.
Recordings
The Federal Wiretapping Act makes it illegal to record any spoken, electronic, or ‘wired’ communication that you are not a participant in (unless you have the explicit consent of all of the participants). If that weren’t enough, the Michigan Eavesdropping Statue makes it illegal to ‘record, amplify, or transmit’ any part of the ‘private discourse of others’ — and in Michigan, you can get fined or imprisoned even if you were a part of the ‘discourse.’ On top of that, even if you do legally record a conversation that you were a part of, you can still be sued for a number of civil reasons if that recording damages the character, financial standing, or relationships of another individual being recorded.
Tracking Devices
Michigan law forbids any non-law-enforcement-officer from placing a GPS tracking device on a car without the permission of the car’s owner. (Exceptions exist for private investigators, parents tracking children for safety reasons, and employers tracking company cars.) It also forbids you from installing tracking software on your spouse’s phone without their knowledge. Thus far, to our understanding, no case exists of a spouse planting a GPS tracker on the other spouse’s person without their permission, but it’s safe to assume it would be illegal as well.
Getting Into Data
Snagging your spouse’s phone — or getting on their computer — and poring over chat logs, old emails, and so on is also usually illegal. If you have only one device that you both share (often the case with family computers; rarely with cellphones), the data is considered to belong to both of you. If you have express permission to use the device, that’s legal, too. But logging onto your spouse’s computer and sending yourself their old emails can land you in jail for 5 years or worse.
How to Do it Legally
The only fully legal way to ‘spy’ on your spouse is to hire a private investigator to do the spying for you. If you believe that your spouse is cheating on you, or is a criminal, and you need to gather evidence in order to mount a case for divorce, hiring a P.I. is the best way to go about it.
Worried that your spouse isn’t the person you wish they were? Call Guiccardo Law at 248-723-5190 and let us guide you toward the best decision for your situation.
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