The device was not at all if that's what you meant. He got friends help to get the devices placed at different homes. Some of his "friends", however, staged thefts and didn't tell him. He pulled that footage within hours of the video going live.

The porch pirates were fake, but it wasn't Rober's fault. Several people he chose as test subjects (aka, people with doorsteps) ended up paying friends/neighbors to steal the package. Once Internet sleuths found this out and informed Rober, he removed the fake reactions from the video.

Not exactly. He had volunteers who placed the packages in front of their houses, and one of the volunteers had a friend or neighbor come by and take the package, faking the footage. It doesn't sound like Marc had anything to do with the incident and he has mentions the issue in the description of the video, though it's also a bit unclear why the volunteer would want to do this.

After his latest video I was wondering if his recording of the thieves in their homes runs afoul of wiretapping laws. I can appreciate that someone who just stole a package probably isn't likely to try to press charges, but made me wonder if he is just assuming that risk.

Maybe the box has a 'shrinkwrap' license agreeing to be recorded?

Surely there are provisions in the law for this? Otherwise I could just go to your home, steal one of your wireless security cameras, place it in my house and have you charged with wiretapping?

Right, but intent matters. You're not allowed to boobytrap your property, but beyond that you won't be held liable for burglars injuring themselves.

I mean, if instead of glitter and fart spray the thing was wired specifically to explode and kill the thief, the argument "they stole my explosives and blew themselves up" won't hold water.

I'm curious what a court would rule on this matter - anywhere from fart spray over property damage to death.

> You're not allowed to boobytrap your property

Apparently no-one told Kevin McCallister

He was home alone.

The box has a lot of text on it to indicate it's a fake product. I wonder if it mentions the microphone.

The project bugs me a bit, as it's designed to find the 3% of people (IIRC from Rober's report) willing to steal and open an obvious fake package -- dumb kids, or mentally ill, or desperate and stupid.

Also, he's famous, so he's risking retaliation bombs.

What bugged me was the complete lack of depth, one of the most interesting (and pertinent) topics surrounding the use of these devices are the legal implications.

There is no state that allows you to bug someone else's conversation. Intentionally causing a surveillance device to be installed in someone's home (which he clearly did) without their consent must present some legal issues?

Likewise, individuals are in some cases liable for the results traps they set. For example, the countdown (on the latest video) is troubling because it's reasonable to expect people to panic, and act erratically in response. What happens if they seriously injure themselves trying to escape the imagined bomb?

Someone else doing something illegal (stealing your "trap" package) doesn't protect you from prosecution or lawsuits.

Anyway, it would hear about the discussion with they had with lawyers before they did this. There's very little depth in many of the more recent videos. They're merely entertainment, not educational/engineering videos.

I guess he'd have to do it in a one-party consent state to be safe? But is this fundamentally different from all the surveillance camera footage of gas station robberies you can find online? Also I believe local news stations like to broadcast footage of porch thieves too.

Example: https://youtube.com/watch?v=Buce4AbOO9k

Who would be the one party consenting in the case of a hidden camera package?