Hey.

A topic that seems simple and obvious causes a lot of misinterpretation and confusion for most people. You can or cannot write phone conversations, what is needed for this, and so on. In this article, we will figure out how to record your conversations.

Content

1. The legal aspect of recording telephone conversations
2. Recording the old fashioned way on a dictaphone – an easy way for everyone
3. How to record a phone conversation on iPhone
4. How to record a phone conversation on Android
5. Short conclusions

The legal aspect of recording telephone conversations

Recording telephone conversations is convenient in many life situations, although it all depends on which country you are in. For example, in some states in the United States, recording conversations is illegal if both parties are not notified of it, for example, California law. And nearby in Arizona, you can record your conversation and not warn the interlocutor about it. Of course, we are talking about recording your own conversations, in almost all countries of the world the recording of other people’s conversations is prohibited, if there is no court permission for this, which is issued to law enforcement agencies. For example, an attempt to listen and record a spouse’s conversation will lead to criminal punishment in the vast majority of countries, the degree of intimacy does not matter, you are breaking the law. Exactly the same approach in Russia, any of the participants in the conversation can, without warning, record the conversation, no permission is required for this. You can record the conversation for personal use, such as listening to it on long winter evenings. Many have heard that the secrecy of telephone conversations in Russia is protected, and they mistakenly interpret Article 138 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation as prohibiting such conversations. But that’s not the case at all, let’s read this article:

Violation of the secrecy of correspondence, telephone conversations, postal, telegraphic or other communications of citizens – shall be punishable by a fine in the amount of up to eighty thousand rubles or in the amount of the wage or salary or any other income of the convicted person for a period of up to six months, or by compulsory labor for a term of up to three hundred and sixty hours, or by corrective labor. works for up to one year.

The same act, committed by a person using his official position, – shall be punishable by a fine in the amount of one hundred thousand to three hundred thousand rubles or in the amount of the wage or other income of the convicted person for a period of one to two years, or by deprivation of the right to hold certain positions or practice. certain activities for a term of two to five years, or compulsory labor for a term of up to four hundred and eighty hours, or compulsory labor for a term of up to four years, or arrest for a term of up to four months, or imprisonment for a term of up to four years.

Accordingly, you will violate the secrecy of negotiations if you do not participate in them yourself, but keep a record. The punishment will be a fine of up to 80 thousand rubles. Another important point, by keeping a recording of the conversation for personal use, you do not violate the law in any way. But if you share such a recording without the permission of the other party, then it also violates the law. I am sure that you called the subscriber service of operators, banks, and other companies and heard the voicemail recording: “In order to improve quality control, all calls are recorded.” Indeed, such companies record all conversations and can use these records in order to determine the essence of the client’s complaints and what happened during the conversation. But they cannot publish such records without your express and explicit permission. Also, the one who recorded the conversation is responsible for its safety, inaccessibility to third parties. This should be borne in mind until the moment you decide to record all your conversations.

Please clarify what the laws in your country are so that you do not violate them when you record conversations with your interlocutors. It is important! The technical ability to record conversations is present anywhere in the world.

So, you have determined that call recording is legal, and now you need to figure out how to do it and what is needed for this.

Recording the old fashioned way on a dictaphone – an easy way for everyone

It is impossible to record your conversation on the dictaphone built into your smartphone, if the manufacturer initially did not allow recording conversations (then no dances with a tambourine are needed). For example, in Samsung smartphones, you will see an inscription that the voice recorder is not supported during a call.

But no one forbids using the same phone to record a conversation on a second device. Then you will need to turn on the speakerphone mode. This is inconvenient, this method is suitable at home, but it does not work on the street. Yes, and your interlocutor will understand that you are speaking in speakerphone mode, this is clearly noticeable. If there is no other way out, the conversation needs to be recorded here and now, then this method is reliable and working, but it is far from convenience and comfort.

How to record a phone conversation on iPhone

The head-on answer sounds simple – no way. If you delve deeper into the question, it turns out that there are several ways and they are relatively exotic. If you hack your device using Jailbreak, you can install software that records all conversations from the line. But the safety of this approach is questionable, and I highly discourage doing this. It’s enough that the iPhone is not the safest smartphone on the planet, and then you can potentially be followed by schoolchildren or people unknown to you. And access to your conversations will be a tidbit to blackmail you. You need it? I think no.

Another expensive and exotic way is to buy a special adapter for iPhone, this is a crowdfunding project on Indiegogo from PhotoFast. A small box is connected to the Lightning connector, into which you insert a regular headset with a 3.5 mm jack. During a call, simply press the record button, and the conversation is saved on the microSD memory card. This accessory costs about $ 125, it is difficult to find it on sale, there is a feeling that Apple has consistently prohibited its sale. The plus is that you can record any conversations in this way, in any applications. And this is all due to the fact that the usual audio output is used. Therefore, I consider this method as exotic as the first, but someone may find this accessory.

The easiest way, which is available on absolutely any phone and directly depends on your operator, is to use the second line. This feature of cellular networks is exploited both by the creators of applications or individual services, and by the operators themselves. For example, in Russia it is Tinkoff Mobile and their beta version of the application.

Here’s how the service is described in the company’s press release:

“Calls and voice messages are recorded using the technical number 333. To record an outgoing call, you must:

• Call number 333
• Click “Add call”
• Call the required subscriber and, after connecting with him, combine calls

To record a conversation that has already begun, you need to:

• During a call with a subscriber, click on the screen “Add call”
• Call number 333
• Merge calls, after which the recording will begin

To record a voice note, dial 333 and dictate a message.

After the call ends, the recording will appear immediately and will be available in the Tinkoff Mobile mobile application in the “Events” -> “Calls” section. The records will be available only to the subscriber who can manage them at will. They can be downloaded and saved to a smartphone, as well as sent by e-mail, SMS or sent to any of the instant messengers. “

This method does not depend on the manufacturer’s brand, it can also work on push-button devices, if they support the second line. On the iPhone, you always need to add a third call with your hands, you can’t do without it.

How to record a phone conversation on Android

Many smartphone manufacturers initially added the ability to record conversations, no additional programs or services are required. For example, you can record conversations on Xiaomi (until recently), OPPO, realme and others. You can clarify this point in the characteristics of your smartphone.

For example, Samsung believes that call recording should not be available to users, and therefore there is no such option by default in most countries of the world. Recording of conversations is prohibited for Samsung smartphones in Russia. For smartphones, you can get root access, install programs that can write all conversations from the line, but I also do not advise doing this – this is an unnecessary risk that you definitely do not need.

In the Play Market, you can find many programs that are shareware or paid and can record calls automatically on any Android smartphone. As a rule, they use the same method as Tinkoff Mobile, this is adding a third line and then sending you a file (or immediately recording on your device).

It is important to point out that most programs cannot record conversations using VoLTE, VoWifi, this must be taken into account and, apparently, such capabilities should be disabled if you need a conversation recording in the application. Also on Android 10, information about calls cannot be transmitted to third-party applications, so you need to manually register the name of the call with whom the conversation took place. This is extremely inconvenient.

Short conclusions

Despite the fact that in many countries of the world the recording of calls for personal use by one of the speakers is allowed, there are practically no technical solutions that would allow it to be done painlessly and conveniently. On Android smartphones, where such a recording is present, you cannot record all conversations in a row, you need to activate this function. Third-party services (third line) cope with this better, they record all conversations non-stop.

Google has banned the recording of conversations on Android and is consistently forcing all manufacturers using GMS services to abandon this opportunity. For example, Xiaomi refused to record calls last year, this option has disappeared. Nevertheless, in the call from Google, which is planned for release in 2020, there is an option for recording conversations, it differs in that by pressing the record key, you also notify your interlocutor about this (he hears a voice warning that the conversation will be recorded) … Saved conversations can be decrypted and read as text. This is a great way to interview over the phone. But for a recording hidden from the interlocutor, this dialer from Google will definitely not work. As a result, if we discard hardware solutions, then only the third line remains, implemented in various services. This is a solution that will work for a long time.

Do you record conversations? Do you need this option?

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