Private detectives are prohibited from spying on citizens using special equipment.
A law has come into force that amends the documents on private security and detective activities. «Custom» detectives are subject to many restrictions, especially on the use of smart technology for surveillance.
It only seems that Sherlock Holmes and other Mrs. Marples exist anywhere but here. According to various sources, over 200,000 people are engaged in private investigation, and on a legal basis at that.
The essence of the requirements of the new law, approved by the Federation Council on December 17 last year, is strict state control and regulation of detective activities.
Private detectives are now required to undergo professional, rather than abstract, «special» training. If previously a detective could be, say, a graduate of a regular military school, such as infantry, artillery, or flight, now a diploma from a specialized educational institution, even a private one, is required.
The record must clearly indicate that you are a detective, not a sapper or flight engineer. Otherwise, you won't get a license.
Punishments have been sharply tightened for those who violate the law. Now, for exceeding their authority or other violations, a «home-made» detective can go to prison for up to seven years.
What violations could these be? There are many. In fact, a detective is prohibited from doing almost anything that allows a detective to effectively perform his duties — in the operational sense.
For example, using special equipment for tracking, eavesdropping or scanning conversations.
God forbid such a detective is caught with a listening «bug» or a hidden camera. Even a police officer «on duty» needs a prosecutor's permit for «technical» surveillance. Otherwise, he can go to jail for a long time, like some law enforcement generals.
Or, what's worst, they'll catch such a detective breaking into someone else's home without permission.
And he's definitely forbidden from using weapons or physical force. Only if there's an urgent need for self-defense. But that's on a general, civil basis. Experience suggests that the court is unlikely to perceive the professional activity of a private detective as mitigating circumstances. Quite the opposite.
And detectives are always and everywhere obliged to share operational information with the police.
If a detective conceals something serious, especially in a high-profile crime case, he may well be held liable, including criminally.
What is important is that a private detective does not have the right to use the «crusts» of state special services or to introduce himself as an employee of any «organs». Moreover, active police officers, security officers, prosecutor's office investigators and other law enforcement officers are prohibited from working in private detective agencies. If you want to become Holmes, take off your shoulder straps.
The new law also has some good news. Instead of three years, a license is now issued for five.
What are private detectives allowed to do under the new law?
The detective market is quite extensive and in demand. It happens that a citizen, especially a private entrepreneur, for various reasons, including purely personal ones, does not want to officially contact the police or the prosecutor's office.
Let's say he suspects that his company has an insider — a «Cossack» sent by competitors. You can't go to the police with this — there is no real crime.
But a private detective can secretly, with the owner's consent, infiltrate the enterprise and probe the team for six months — who is who. A police detective will not always do this if there is no hope of uncovering a major financial scam.
There is a simpler version of commercial counterintelligence — finding out all the information about partners, searching for «undercurrents» of an upcoming deal. Even the investigation of a banal theft from an office safe is often entrusted to a private detective, so as not to attract unnecessary attention from the state to their own cash.
Another, very popular service is the detection of adultery. Some spouses are very concerned about the fidelity of their halves and are ready to pay for the moment of truth. In addition, with the help of detectives, parents learn a lot of interesting things about their children and other close relatives.
They say that it is on the basis of these observations and investigations that wills are changed, and million-dollar and smaller inheritances are reassigned. Detectives often do accounting, office work, and even secretarial work, shoveling through tons of documents, starting long correspondence with numerous authorities.
After all, it is known that 99 percent of information is not in secret ciphers or hiding places, but in open sources — newspapers, official reports, library or scientific archives. You just need to know what and where to look.
Most often, private detectives are contacted to find missing relatives or friends, find out the background of business partners, secure a real estate or car deal. Clients ask detectives to check if they are being followed visually, wiretapped, or if someone is hacking their computer.
Detective services cost different amounts. As a rule, the price is negotiable, depending on the complexity of the task and confidentiality. But there are also standard rates. For example, for external surveillance, that is, banal surveillance, security agencies ask for an average of ten dollars per hour.
And finding a missing person costs from four thousand rubles.
And yet, how can detectives combine the requirements of the law and the wishes of clients?
Elementary, as the famous Sherlock Holmes would say. Here is a simple example. Let's say some gentleman wants to catch his wife in adultery.
The private detective has everything — photos, home address, place of work, addresses of girlfriends and friends, fitness center, favorite bar, probable routes of movement. He just doesn't have the right to interfere in this woman's personal life and use special spy equipment.
But these procedural «little things» are easy to get around.
In any case, the detective is obliged to conclude a contract with the client for the provision of services — this is required by law. But the contract may specify not assistance to a potential cuckold, but a search for a missing wife. So the detective rushes to search for the allegedly missing woman. And what emerges during the investigation — minor technical details.
By the way, about technical details. Yes, you can't use hidden cameras and microphones. But with a mobile phone or even an ordinary «point-and-shoot» — why not?
They say he was filming a cityscape, and the unfaithful wife and her lover accidentally got into the frame. That's how it happens.
What technical means does a private detective have the right to use?
For the investigation that he is obliged to conduct under the concluded contract, he can use video recordings.
Again, if the cameras were installed legally.
That is, if the owner of the office secretly looks through the office premises, without the knowledge of the employees, this is a violation.
Have you noticed that in many stores they playfully offer you to smile — like, a video camera is filming?
In that case — you can't find fault. Otherwise — a violation of the Constitution, interference in privacy.
Mikhail Falaleev Rossiyskaya Gazeta