To think any man would know this wasn’t acceptable.

[Mummytoswiftie25]

I took my DD to a movie with a few friends yesterday - it was a specific movie they had been waiting to see and so they went all out and dressed up in costumes.
we were waiting in the food court outside and the girls were mucking about hugging etc when a man approached us with his mobile phone out and lifted his phone up, I automatically went “ what are you doing “ and he proceeded to then ask us if it was ok to take a picture of any DD alone. I asked him if he had taken any other pictures and to move away. I called security over and asked to see the photos he has taken, he had taken a few of the girls playing around and then told security it was a mis understanding and they he just appreciated her costume, deleted the photos and they let him leave.

surely any man I would say 35-40 years old would know this to be wrong ?

No, it's not. Although a food court would be private, not public.

It should be illegal to take photos of children without consent of parents.

It’s not. At all. I don’t know where people get this idea from.

Edit: apologies, I misread your post and thought you were stating that it was illegal.

The problem with such a law is it would make all photography in a public place effectively illegal, including all photojournalism, street photography and event photography. Oh and surveillance cameras, even Ring doorbells.

Doesn’t mean what he was doing was right or reasonable.

Yup

I hope you/security deleted from his deleted folder on his phone otherwise he still has them.

I saw a guy pretending to be taking a call on his phone but taking photos of children in a local park

When my partner told me I decided to go over but he left

I then searched online and found out that it's not an offence!

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-68826423.amp

But it's fine coz it's not illegal apparently.

We should be kicking up more of a stink about incidents like this. All sorts can be done with pictures and video footage now.

Damn right I'd be like OP and challenge any person filming my daughter and her friends. Totally willing to look like a prat if it turns out they have a legitimate reason. And if they don't, while they are apparently protected by law to do it anyway I'm also protected by law if I loudly and publicly call them out on their fucking creepy actions.

You can't go around deleting stuff from people's phones, thank goodness we're not in some kind of police state

Like it or not the man hasn't done anything illegal based on the OPs telling of what happened

Totally willing to look like a prat if it turns out they have a legitimate reason.

If it’s not illegal it will be legitimate.

Well done OP. It is possible to create explicit images and videos with AI and it only requires a couple of photos of someone's face, the software is easy to access, it doesn't even require the darkweb. It is creepy and depressing. I would ask anyone I didn't know to not take photos of dc and delete any pictures

It doesn't matter that it's not illegal.....its just wrong and not OK
I don't want it to be illegal....there are justifiable reasons for taking photos of strangers in public including kids. I will defend anyone who takes a photo of teens behaving anti-socially and passes it on to the relevant authority. Or anyone who accidentally catches another family in the background or foreground of their intended shot.

But no - walking up to a group and taking photos without asking because of what they are wearing is not OK.

Maybe not illegal, but weird in the extreme. As others have said, you don't need much for AI to work with. OP was correct to challenge. Not appropriate.

Just randomly filming or taking pictures of someone's kid is a legitimate thing to do? Can I come round and film your kids this evening?

That doesn’t preclude it being wrong…
I can think of no reason for a strange man to photograph a little girl, can you?

People are forgetting Context here. What kind of costumes were the girls wearing? Were they movie themed or what?
It is very possible they sparked the man's interest and that he didn't realise taking a photo would be offensive - he could have been from a different culture, ND, etc.
You say they weren't sexy or revealing in any way, so I wouldn't immediately jump to "he's a creep".
Slightly different scenario, but I know a parent who got told off and prevented from taking a photo of her own DD during a swimming party. It was because of the other kids around. She genuinely had no idea of this, in her country completely normal.

I'm a man and I would never do that in a million years, I'd probably just smile and remember my Daughter at that age and all the similar things we used to do.

Lots of things are wrong, in my personal opinion, but not illegal. Some things that are illegal are not wrong, again, in my personal opinion. My personal opinion means nothing in law.

Ok so we get it. It's totally legal to act like a nonce and there is l bugger all we can do to stop men being creepy twats (tale as old as time).

You could campaign to get the law changed in this respect.

How old were they? Was it possible to have assumed they were young adults?

If they were in costume from a franchise its entirely possible he's a fan

It's still strongly discouraged because of the creep aspect but he might just have been admiring their costumes. He even asked for a photo (which should have just been the case)

Him actually approaching you and speaking and not running immediately would suggest it was less likely to be nefarious as someone up to no good doesn't like to be challenged or seen and would not approach you or hang around when security got involved.

He sounds perhaps a little socially unconscious rather than a creep

And a grown up shouldn't be going round taking photos of a child without parents consent. Whether it's legal or not.

Jesus. Yes I am amazed at the cheek of this guy and his motives.

You could campaign to get the law changed in this respect.

///

Thanks, I'd not considered this.

I don’t think people are suggesting the man’s actions were illegal and he should be thrown in prison (the poster who did was promptly corrected). Rather, they are saying that it was strange and wrong.

I don’t see the relevance of its legality, as the law is not the dictator of morality – which is what people are discussing. Are you really so cowed you couldn’t possibly say something that is legal isn’t acceptable?