California two party consent when calling automated line
I received a jury summons and per instructions, called in this weekend to see if I was expected to report for jury duty on Monday. The automatic system asked for identifying information and then proceeded to tell me that I did not need to report and that I was excused from jury duty for the next year. So yay.
Now the legal question. I was thinking that I should call the automated line again and record the dismissal in case there's a mix up. Would this be a violation of California's 2 party recording consent law?
This is idle curiosity. I know that written confirmation follows the dismissal but this has wondering about how California's two party consent laws applies when the receiving party is completely automated. There's plenty of information about the application when the calling party is automated.
Posted May 8, 2022, 5:28 PM UTC
To my knowledge, no California court has been asked to rule on whether automated telephone answering and interface systems carry forward the privacy interests and expectations of their creators.
In general, I would expect that an automated answering system cannot conduct a "confidential conversation", and thus is not a party to a confidential conversation by telephone.