- A Taiwanese man used a robot vacuum to record his wife's alleged affair.
- He won NT$500,000 in a civil suit against his wife and her lover.
- The court ruled his recording violated privacy rights despite marital status.
A man in Taiwan who used a robot vacuum cleaner to uncover his wife's alleged affair won a civil lawsuit against her and the other man but was later sentenced to prison for secretly recording private footage. According to a recently released court ruling reported by local media, the man married in 2021 and lived with his parents. He and his wife mainly used their holiday home during vacations. His suspicions about his wife reportedly grew in September 2023 after he found a used toothbrush at the property. He later reviewed surveillance footage from a parking garage and noticed an unfamiliar man who had previously driven his wife home.
Around three months later, the husband remotely activated the robot vacuum at the holiday home through its mobile app. The device had a built-in audio function that allowed users to communicate through it.
Instead of simply allowing him to speak to his wife, the vacuum's live feed captured her with another man in an intimate position. The husband recorded the footage and later submitted it as evidence in a civil case against his wife and the other man, arguing that their relationship had violated his marital rights.
He first sought NT$2 million (around Rs 60 lakh) in damages, South China Morning Post reported. The civil court concluded that the relationship had gone beyond ordinary friendship and ordered the wife and the other man to pay him NT$500,000 (around Rs 15 lakh) in compensation.
However, his victory was short-lived. He soon had to face a separate legal battle over the way he obtained the evidence.
His wife accused him of secretly recording private footage without her consent. The man argued that the recording was justified because the footage had been accepted as evidence in the civil proceedings.
The court rejected that defence, ruling that marital obligations do not override an individual's right to privacy. It also found that the recording was intentional. Any lights or voice notifications produced by the robot vacuum were not enough to establish that the woman knew she was being recorded or had consented to it.
The man was ultimately sentenced to five months in prison and fined NT$150,000 (Rs 4.5 lakh( for unlawfully recording private images.
Under Taiwanese law, secretly recording or disclosing another person's private activities or intimate information without authorisation can carry a prison sentence of up to three years and a fine of up to NT$300,000 (Rs 9 lakh).
