Police Overreaction/Ignorance Regarding Photographers

My attention was brought to this BBC article this morning about police (and other authorities) preventing folks taking photos in the cause of ‘preventing terrorism’ and ‘prevention of paedophilia’. Interesting.

I take photos a lot – rarely a day goes by without taking a photo or ten, of lots of things really. I don’t do ‘paparazzi’ shots, and have a tendency to check it’s OK with the venue/artiste if I’m at a gig. You know the score – check and nobody can complain. Yet I had a policeman challenge me when I was taking this photo – you can actually see Mr Plod in the background. I pulled back quickly from the family and took the pic (hence why it’s blurry), and the policeman challenged me. Lovely!

Indeed, Mr Plod needs education: It’s not illegal to take pics in the street, it’s not “against the data protection act” for someone to be in the way of me when I’m taking a photo of Westgate, it’s especially not “copyright” because your building is in the way (one I got when doing some historical photos)!