I see there's some confusion and questions over this comment made previously by another poster:
(a) People. When you take photographs of strangers or of property belonging to strangers, it could amount to harassment. Unlike other jurisdictions such as the UK, Singapore does not have legislation regarding harassment, but the tort of harassment has been recognised in the case of Malcomson v Narseh Kumar Mehta [2001] 4 SLR 454. Having said that, it is unlikely that taking a photo would amount to harassment because the legal requirement is that there must be a course of conduct that causes alarm and not a single incident. As far as I know Singapore does not have any other privacy laws.
I've looked up the actual case itself and the words
"a course of conduct that causes alarm and not a single incident" does not appear anywhere in the judgment, hence you guys will need to ask the original poster what he meant.
That said, in the actual case, what was held is as follows:
"Harassment mean a course of conduct by a person, whether by words or action, directly or through third parties,
sufficiently repetitive in nature as would cause, and which he ought reasonably to know would cause, worry, emotional distress or annoyance to another person. This definition was not intended to be exhaustive but one that sufficiently encompassed the facts of the present case."
In that particular case, the facts were:
"Mehta subsequently embarked on a course of conduct with such persistence that he made life unbearable for Malcomson and his former colleagues at Zerity. He - (a) trespassed, and made a nuisance of himself, at Malcomsons residence and at Zeritys office, (b) made numerous telephone calls, and sent numerous e-mails and SMS messages to Malcomson and Zeritys staff, and (c) harassed Malcomson. These acts caused the plaintiffs much annoyance and distress."
Mehta is the defendant, and Malcomson is the Plaintiff.
Hence, in that case, it was a series of repeated incidents which led to a finding of harrassment. What is the original poster's view is that one single incident of taking a photograph is not likely to amount to liability under this tort of harrassment.
I hope it is now clearer to those who had asked the question.
