User:Louis/Cameras in New Zealand school bathrooms

In 2013 the New Zealand Privacy Commissioner found that a CCTV camera in the men's toilets of a pub breached the Privacy Act, and that a warning sign would not have made it lawful. In October 2023 the same office published guidance for schools that want cameras in student toilet blocks. Instead of refusing, it tells them to put up signage, aim the cameras away from toileting and changing, and do a privacy impact assessment that the Act does not require.

The signage the school guidance asks for is the exact remedy the 2013 case rejected.

We considered that a camera placed in the men's toilet area was capturing highly sensitive information in an unreasonably intrusive manner and that it breached principle 4. It was a permanent fixture and it overlooked the urinals. Even if the signage had indicated that there was a camera in the toilet area, it would not have made the camera justifiable.

Case Note 244873, in which the Privacy Commissioner held that signage would not have justified a camera overlooking the urinals in a pub's men's toilets. Source: Office of the Privacy Commissioner.

What the Privacy Act says about children

That 2013 decision applied principle 4 of the Privacy Act 1993, which barred collection by unfair or unreasonably intrusive means and said nothing about age. The Privacy Act 2020 replaced it, and Parliament added a clause naming one group.

An agency may collect personal information only: (a) by a lawful means; and (b) by a means that, in the circumstances of the case (particularly in circumstances where personal information is being collected from children or young persons), (i) is fair; and (ii) does not intrude to an unreasonable extent upon the personal affairs of the individual concerned.

Parliament tightened the standard for children in 2020. Three years later the Commissioner's office published the checklist for putting cameras in their toilet blocks.

Schools that put cameras in student toilets

Named in reporting between 2011 and 2025:

Year	School	What was installed	Source
2011	Wainuiomata High School, near Wellington	Installed after a Privacy Commission warning it may breach student privacy
2018	Tauraroa Area School, Northland	Two cameras inside the Year 9 to 11 girls' and boys' toilets; the principal said they were meant to cover lockers
2021	Queen Elizabeth College, Palmerston North	Camera facing the sinks in the girls' bathroom; cautioned by the Privacy Commission and kept it
2021	Wakatipu High School, Queenstown	Corridor cameras seeing through glass into the cubicle foyer, used to count who entered a cubicle
2023	Rangiora High School	Cameras in toilet corridors, triggered by a vape sensor rather than recording continuously
2024	Cromwell College, Central Otago	Cameras in toilets; the board said they would record only the common corridor area
2024	Awatapu College and Palmerston North Boys' High School	Communal-area cameras on trial at Awatapu; already in bathrooms at the boys' school
2025	Nelson College for Girls	CCTV in bathrooms; a student reported no signage and a camera visible from the toilet

The Secondary Principals' Association called this common practice as far back as 2011. By 2026 the Ministry of Education's school property guidance recommended CCTV for large schools and pointed readers to the Privacy Commissioner's bathroom advice, making a camera in a children's toilet block a line item in routine property guidance.

Cameras found where the school said they were not

At Tauraroa Area School in 2018, Year 11 student Aart Lewis said his fellow students felt pretty disgusted because, in the boys toilets, [the camera] looks straight onto the urinal. The Herald reported principal Grant Burns saying the cameras had been fitted inside the toilets by mistake. Students covered the lens with paper; staff removed it at least three times, within an hour each time.

At Nelson College for Girls in 2025, principal Claire O'Fee said the camera has been professionally installed with a field of vision blanked to ensure it cannot record the cubicles. A student said the camera was visible while using the toilet and that there was no signage about the use of CCTV. After the school was approached for comment, tape was put over most of the camera. The student's answer: They obviously did it for a reason.

A field of vision that needs tape over it was not blanked.

Play the recording (MP4, 18 seconds)

A dome camera mounted on the ceiling of a toilet block containing cubicles and urinals. Footage supplied to Louis Rossmann by a viewer who did not identify themselves; the school, the location, and the date of filming are unknown, so this clip documents no particular school. File details: File:School-toilet-block-ceiling-camera.mp4.

Who the schools consulted

Awatapu College reported more than 80 percent support for its trial, from parents and caregivers. The people who would be filmed were not the people polled. Queen Elizabeth College installed its camera at the start of a term; parents and students said they did not know until five days in, and the school's own policy at the time said cameras would be in corridors or outside areas. The board kept it as a deterrent after the Privacy Commissioner's office warned of substantial damages if a student was harmed by it.

Rangiora High School's principal Bruce Kearney reported a cleaner result, and his own wording carries the qualification: We had a couple of kids who got a little bit upset, but I have had zero negative responses in relation to putting these cameras up. Children who got upset and negative responses are being counted as two different things. At Wakatipu High School a student was stood down, meaning suspended for a short period, after a camera caught them repeatedly entering a toilet cubicle with other students; staff used the footage to monitor how many students were in cubicles at once.

Growing up watched

Every one of these installations is defensible in isolation: vaping is real, the board consulted somebody, the footage gets deleted after three weeks, the camera points at the basins. Each step is small enough to wave through, which is how the next one gets easier. Cromwell College's board said so out loud: other schools were doing it, so the college would follow suit. A student starting at Nelson College for Girls in 2025 will spend her school years being filmed on the way into the toilet, told the camera is not pointed at her, and answered with tape over the lens when she says she can see it.

Getting children used to that is the real cost, and it does not depend on anyone misusing a clip. Children who grow up watched in the bathroom become adults who expect to be watched everywhere. No privacy impact assessment measures that, and no drop in vaping is worth teaching it.

See also

• NZ eRUC all-cars 24/7 GPS Surveillance proposal
• Flock license plate readers
• Anti-privacy legislation
• Hikvision