Dad the panopticon

“My brother and I were constantly monitored this way by our dad. We didn’t find the recording device, he actually sat us down and played the recording for us where we talked about secretly visiting our mother who we were forbidden from seeing for no other reason than her leaving. He also had a software program on our family computer that would log our chats. That’s how he found her address and also found out that I had smoked weed for the first time.

The only thing that really came of these situations were him sitting us down to “out” us and our shared phobia of cameras and hidden audio.” — pale_moon_pixie

Psycho dad

“My ex idiot was exactly like that. Monitored our teen daughter’s every move when she was there for court-ordered visitation. Monitored the phones and the tvs. Spied on her every move. Needless to say I would not let her bring back any of the “gifts” he tried to send her home with. I would also regularly empty out her school bag since it was the only thing that went over there, and run it through the washing machine.” — MamaBear4485

This is upsetting

“I found the images/videos taken with a hidden smart phone. Thought my fiance had relapsed on drugs, went snooping when he left for work. He was secretly recording our preteen daughter in the bathroom, the shower, changing in her room… He is now in jail, I was granted protection orders for myself and both of our daughters and I am filing to terminate his rights once he is convicted. Oh and he HAD relapsed and was cheating but I didnt know any of that until after he was in jail. He manipulated and abused me for years, but I never imagined he would victimize his own daughter.” — throwmeaway32392

Ex-friend

“An ex-friend of mine was recording us going to the bathroom in his parents house. This was early 2000’s, and we were all high schoolers. Technically it wasn’t me that discovered the camera, but a friend. He noticed the linen closet was slightly open and says he saw a glint off the lens.

No idea if that was the case but anyone who had used the restroom that night would have been on the tape, as it was nearly fully used up.

We threw the whole camera in the fire and held him back from trying to save it. He got roughed up and (not proud of this) thrown into the fire. He was ok. Minor burns. Didn’t even need a hospital.

We told his parents. They moved away the next year.

I sometimes think about what could have happened to him if we were in the early 2010’s instead. Pretty sure it would have been way more serious for both sides.” — SlickerWicker

“They didn’t know it was a hidden camera”

“Found a hidden camera hidden our bathroom pointed at the shower. Turns out it was family (not blood related) who placed it in there. Confronted them and they said they didn’t know it was a hidden camera. I let it go because I was young. Found four more, years apart, one fairly recently. It tore my family apart. I’m moving out of state at the end of the year, when hopefully things are a little safer as I’m immunocompromised. Dealing with it is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do because I was particularly very close to this family member, and I’m not doing that great a job dealing with it.” — throwaway8302020

I still check for cameras

“The same thing happened to me when I was 15, except my family member was blood related. Camera was in the AC vent above the door. To this day, I have to constantly check that doors are locked and I search every room for tampering to feel safe.” — chairmanmeow7

Cactus cam

“I was regifted a plastic cactus figurine by a coworker. When I was going to bed I accidentally kicked the cactus over and found a spy cam inside.” — featoutsider

Apparently it’s not illegal!

“No cameras or microphones were recording me but my landlord had drilled holes in the ceiling of the bathroom in my apartment and the 3 other on the top floor and had been watching us all in the bathroom for a year.

A girl on my floor looked up one day in the shower and saw that he had been looking down on her.

He went to jail but I wasn’t able to do anything because there apparently are (were?) no laws on the books in Iowa to prosecute peeping Tom cases when the victim and perpetrator are the same sex.” — tgrote555

Nanny cams

“My last nanny job was in the summer of 2019. It lasted 3 weeks. The family was…well…we didn’t see eye to eye. They seemed totally normal and great during the interview, of course. Every day that I came in after starting, there were more and more red flags.

They would not allow me to close the door when I used the bathroom. Kids were 2 and 5. Their reasoning was that the door needed to be open in case the 2 year old needed me. Okay, maybe I could understand that, but the parents WORKED FROM HOME. They were in the room right off of the bathroom and could easily see me with the door open! So that was just something that was non-negotiable for me and I ended up holding my pee in for a few days because I kind of didn’t feel like being seen by the mom or the DAD when I was peeing!

One day, both parents went out and left me alone with the kids. I thought we had a pretty good day. The mom, who was watching us from undisclosed cameras all day, had a different opinion. When I was making lunch, she claimed that I put her children (who were sitting in the living room watching tv) in danger by cooking on the front burner instead of the back, and what if the 2 year old (who wasn’t tall enough to do this) ran in the room and banged the pot off the stove and spilled boiling water all over herself? Okay, unlikely, but if you wanted me to use the back burner, all you had to do was TELL ME instead of spying on me. There were a lot more weird things but you get the idea.

After that day with the cameras, we parted ways since I told them in my interview that I was uncomfortable with nanny cams. And they just straight up didn’t tell me they had them, in every room, and the one camera could definitely see into the bathroom that I wasn’t allowed to be in with a closed door.” — fuego09

Watched

“I was an au pair and the family was normal and weren’t strict with me or anything. But one weekend when they were out of town wth the kids I was home alone and on the couch eating a snack. My show ended and it was silent and I heard a noise and looked up and saw a camera turning towards me. It must have been motion activated or just did a turn every once in a while? It wasn’t hidden I’d just never noticed it so I found it really unsettling because I didn’t realize I had been being recorded. The fact that it turned towards me made me wonder if they could control it or something on their phones and turned it to see what I was doing. I ended up unplugging it when they went out of town because it creeped me out and they never mentioned it.” — shicole3

“Brown boots would look better”

“My ex husband and I had been separated for a few months and I was getting ready to go out to eat with my cousin. As soon as I got dressed, my phone rings and it was the ex hubby wanting to know where I was going dressed like that and my brown boots would look better. (He bought or approved all of my clothes when we were married and told me what to wear when we went out) I found cameras in almost every room of the house. He owned a security alarm business so I assumed there would be one or two but not that he would be watching me all the time.” — Liv0613

He was the Peeping Tom

“A few years ago we had a halloween party and I rigged an old busted camcorder to the top of my shower curtain aimed at the toilet. The bathroom is small and it was obvious/in plain sight. No batteries/power/no media. Not ONE PERSON mentioned it. At the end of the party I was like “wtf guys. NOBODY’S gonna mention the camcorder over the toilet??!!” Nobody had even seen it, somehow.” — tuenthe463

Family “friend”

“The creep ended up in jail. Turns out a family friend had put a hidden camera in my sister’s room so he could see her naked after she got out of the shower.

Yeah it didn’t take long for her to find out which cause hell to break loose and my dad almost went to jail because he went over to the sicko’s house and beat the Christ out of him.” — DemandParticular

Predator lifeguard

“This happened to a friend.

She was with some of her other friends (11-14 y/o) swimming in the lake. When they were about to leave, the lifeguard told them that they could change in the lifeguards lockers room and for some reason they didnt suspect anything wierd of it.

But when they had already changed clothes my friend noticed a phone recording them and she took it and stoped the recording and left it there.

She went to the police and reported him.

They ended up arresting him, he lost his job.

The police told her that the video was deleted from the phone but that they could find evidence that it existed.

They have to wait 2 years more to take him to court.” — guatdefuk

Fight, flight, freeze

“Some young guy filmed me naked in a sauna. I caught him and he looked scared and shut his phone. He ran.

My head was spinning and I took too long out of confusion, to tell a manager. By the next morning they could not identify this person.

I wish I said something immediately. I didn’t. He could have destroyed his life but at least he has a crappy video of some white dude naked in a sauna with his dick out.” — SillyGayBoy

Stepdad from hell

“I didn’t actually find the cameras but my younger brother found the recordings. My stepfather had set up some cams with shitty quality, mostly for audio and not to watch. My older brother later confirmed it and told me mum found them and told my stepfather to take them down. Dunno if he did. It made me extremely paranoid for a while.” — hackipeter

Another bathroom cam

“Found a hidden camera in my aunt’s bathroom (luckily right before changing my clothes), told my mom but was scared to tell my aunt right away as I didn’t want to upset her during a rough time in their lives.

Her boyfriend was arrested within a couple months and sent to prison when my little cousin found a secret app on his iPad that had been recording people naked in bathrooms. There were camera’s in their bathrooms, my grandparent’s bathroom, and the family bathroom at his secret girlfriend’s house. Several people were filmed, including minors.

As far as I know he’s out now, but he was with my aunt for like 13 years and they have two sons together.” — randonautMI

Boy”friend”

“Didn’t happen to me but happened to a girl at my University.

Her boyfriend hid a few spy cameras in her bathroom and watched her and her roommates for months before they found it. He plead guilty and went to jail.” — kaitievicky

Creepy Bob

“One morning after swim practice my freshman year my friends and I saw a blinking red light in a locker with a towel draped down the door. Turns out it was a janitor we called creepy bob recording us in the showers…” — Stealthy_Bomber

Gaslighting

“My sister’s fiance’s baby mama has now twice discovered her boyfriend hiding cameras in her children’s rooms. The first time he got her to believe it was a neighbor so they moved. The end result of that will hopefully be her losing custody because she still lets him around her kids.” — Gausgovy

He was listening through Alexa

“Part of my moms divorce was because we found a fuck ton of hidden cameras in her house. Her ex husband had every thing bugged. Cameras pointed at the entrance/exits and drive way. Cameras in the livingroom, dining room, hallways, bedrooms. She swears there was never one in the bathroom but im suspicious of that. Id seen enough suspect “random” wires that in that bathroom that I’m fairly certain he had a camera hidden in the bathroom exhaust fan. He had her laptop bugged so he had remote access to it from work. He had keyloggers installed to keep tabs of her passwords. She took her car in for an oil change and the mechanic found a tracking device connected to her battery. He pointed it out because it was placed in such a way that it was mostly hidden and that seemed suspicious to the mechanic.

Once the divorce started and he officially moved out we scanned the entire house for bugs and didn’t find anything. So we really freaked out when he started calling/texting/emailing her complimenting her outfits, asking how friends were as they were in the house, asking how her trip to the store was and other really odd things he couldnt have known about.

Turns out before he left he somehow connected his phone to my moms alexa dot and was using Alexa to record my mom and whoever else was close enough to Alexa to have their audio picked up. He also somehow had access to my moms laptop still and was using the built in webcam to watch/record her/the house.

That guy has some serious mental issues. She did take it to the police, however they were “unable” to do anything about it as his name was on the house and her car. Therefore it was his own property and he could do what he wanted with it. Unless he became threatening they refused to do anything about it. We pointed out that cameras in bedrooms are very much illegal but were brushed aside and told it was a personal problem.

In the end he never faced any kind of legal backlash.” — RealAbstractSquidII