Individual fined Dhs25,000 for stealthily filming another and posting footage on Snapchat

The Abu Dhabi Family, Civil and Administrative Cases Court ruled that a person must pay Dhs25,000 in compensation to another person after filming him in a public place while doing sums without his consent and publishing the footage on Snapchat.

The plaintiff filed a lawsuit against the defendant, requesting that he be obliged to pay him Dhs50,000 in compensation for the material and moral damages he suffered as a result of his privacy being violated, which led to him being subjected to contempt and suspicion in his workplace and among his relatives and peers. The plaintiff also requested that the defendant be obligated to pay the fees, expenses and attorney’s fees.

The plaintiff filed his lawsuit on the basis that the defendant filmed him without his consent while he was doing sums calculations in a public place and published the footage on the social networking application Snapchat.

The Court explained that, in a previous criminal ruling, it had been established that the Court had convicted the defendant of the charges brought against him and sentenced him to a fine of Dhs25,000, the deletion of his Snapchat account and a six-month ban on using the information network. This ruling had become final and binding.