Professor John Robertson OBA
I used to be a sociologist but I’m better now, though I still love a good moral panic. Remember the last one? Spiking women with date rape drugs by hypodermic needle, almost impossible, rather than spiking drinks, worryingly easy. Why has it stopped? Not one arrest.
I asked AI – Have there been any reports of proven cases of an employee bugging their boss in Scotland?
No publicly reported or documented cases in Scotland appear to involve an employee successfully planting a covert bugging device (such as a hidden microphone, audio recorder, or camera) on or against their boss that led to a proven criminal prosecution or conviction.
Key Findings Specific to Scotland
- Scottish law on covert recording aligns closely with the rest of the UK: One-party consent applies for participant recordings under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers (Scotland) Act 2000 (RIP(S)A) and related legislation. However, placing a device to intercept conversations without being a participant (true “bugging”) could be a criminal offence, potentially under privacy laws, data protection rules, or the Investigatory Powers Act 2016.
- No Scottish court cases (from Scotcourts.gov.uk records or news reports) involve employee-on-boss bugging leading to prosecution.
- Most reported covert surveillance in Scotland relates to employers monitoring employees (e.g., for theft or misconduct), police undercover operations, or unrelated matters like domestic abuse recordings (e.g., a case involving spousal recordings leading to arrest).
- Employment tribunals in Scotland (and the UK) may admit employee-made covert recordings as evidence in disputes (e.g., unfair dismissal or discrimination), but they are often viewed as a breach of trust. No cases were found where this involved bugging a boss and resulted in police action.
- Broader searches (including Police Scotland reports, news, and legal databases) yielded no matches for such incidents.
If an employee were to bug their boss in Scotland, it might be handled internally (e.g., dismissal for misconduct) or as a civil privacy/data protection issue via the Information Commissioner’s Office, rather than a criminal prosecution. The reverse (employer bugging employee) has more precedents, but again, that’s not the scenario here.
So is this hysteria? Watch out for it to spread to the even more febrile worlds in Westminster or local councils. Then watch it fade with no charges made.
Finally, the MSM reports of bugging ‘devices‘ suggests they need updating.
This is the modern way, I’ve been told:
https://www.keepersecurity.com/blog/2024/02/01/how-do-cybercriminals-spread-malware/
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
No doubt you will be proved correct John, but the damage, as usual, has already been done. Anything, even downright lies, that damage, in their eyes, the cause of Scottish Independence, then that is a job well done. As I have said many times before, sorry for being boring, that the subject, no matter how trivial, they, the British State, think might persuade Scots to reject Independence when we next get the opportunity, is worthwhile. And despite their cause being a sinking ship, they will use every means at their disposal, and there are plenty, to try to damage the Independence movement.
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You were never being boring.
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