Recording Consent Guide

⚠️ This is a practical guide, not legal advice. It is designed to help you use Algopulse lawfully — it does not replace consultation with a lawyer qualified for your specific situation and jurisdiction. The legal information below is current as of the verification date stated at the top of this document and may change.

1. Who this guide is for

This guide is for you if you invite the Notetaker to a Meeting and thereby start recording it. Under the Terms of Service, you — not Algopoetica sp. z o.o. — are responsible for obtaining the consent of all Meeting Participants before recording begins. This guide is here to help; it does not replace a lawyer’s advice for unusual situations (evidentiary recordings, meetings involving minors, especially sensitive data).

2. The core rule: get consent from every participant

Always obtain the consent of every Meeting Participant before you start recording — regardless of where they are located. This is the one rule worth remembering even if you read nothing else here. Participants in an online meeting are often spread across different states and countries, and you cannot realistically determine which rules apply to each of them before every meeting. Adopting the strictest common standard — consent from everyone — is the only approach that works regardless of who joins.

3. Federal law

The Federal Wiretap Act (18 U.S.C. § 2511) sets a One-Party Consent standard — recording is lawful if at least one party to the conversation consents. This is only a floor: state law may require more, and where it does, state law controls (Section 4 below). An exception applies to recordings made for the purpose of committing a crime or tort, which are never protected.

4. State law (One-Party vs. All-Party Consent)

One-Party Consent means consent from one party (which can be you) is sufficient. All-Party (Two-Party) Consent means every participant must consent. The table below is for orientation only:

Standard	States
All-Party Consent	California, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington, Connecticut (civil liability)
One-Party Consent	all other states

⚠️ This list is indicative and subject to change, current as of the verification date at the top of this document. Some states apply different standards to telephone calls, in-person conversations, and electronic communications, and case law is not always consistent. Do not treat this table as settled — if your business regularly involves participants from a particular state, confirm the current position with a lawyer licensed in that state.

Two states warrant particular attention: California (Cal. Penal Code § 632), one of the most actively enforced All-Party Consent regimes, with a real practice of civil litigation; and Illinois (the Biometric Information Privacy Act, “BIPA”) — if speaker identification in your Meeting relies on comparing voice samples (rather than simply matching voice activity to an audio track), it may fall within BIPA’s scope, which carries significant statutory damages pursued by private plaintiffs. See Section 8 for how Algopulse handles this.

Because this list is inherently uncertain and changes over time, Algopoetica sp. z o.o. recommends applying the All-Party Consent standard to every Meeting with U.S.-based participants, regardless of state.

5. International meetings

When a Meeting includes participants from multiple countries, apply the strictest standard among the represented jurisdictions — in practice, consent from everyone and full notice of recording. Do not attempt to vary your approach mid-meeting based on where a participant is located. For countries outside the EU and the U.S., this guide does not provide jurisdiction-specific rules; consult local counsel if you regularly record participants from a specific country, and apply the core rule above in the meantime.

6. How to obtain and document consent in practice

• In the meeting invitation, add a line participants will see before joining: “This meeting will be recorded and transcribed using Algopulse to produce a summary and action items. By joining, you consent to this. If you do not consent, please tell the organizer before the meeting starts.”
• At the start of the meeting, read aloud (or post in chat) a short prompt before substantive discussion begins: “Before we start: this meeting is being recorded and transcribed by Algopulse. Is everyone okay with that?” Wait for an affirmative response — a nod is not enough once a recording is running; you need a verbal or written response that is itself captured.
• Documenting consent: the simplest and most reliable method is capturing verbal consent at the very start of the recording — consent then becomes part of the record. Consent given in the platform chat is equally effective and easier to locate later.
• Late joiners: repeat the notice and obtain that person’s confirmation as soon as they join, before substantive discussion resumes.
• If a participant declines: turn off recording for that participant’s portion of the meeting (or the whole meeting, if it cannot be separated), or offer an alternative such as manual notes without the Notetaker.
• Recurring meetings: consent obtained once does not automatically cover future meetings in the same series — reconfirm it at the start of each recorded meeting, unless you have a separate, explicit arrangement covering the whole series.
• Retaining proof of consent: a recording with verbal consent captured at the start is itself evidence. If consent was given in chat, retain a screenshot or export of the chat alongside the recording.

7. What Algopulse does and does not do

What we do: the Notetaker joins the Meeting as a visible participant — confirmed visible on Google Meet and Discord; the architecture on Microsoft Teams is analogous. On Google Meet and Microsoft Teams, the Notetaker additionally posts a message in the Meeting chat identifying that the Meeting is being recorded and who invited it (LDR-018). On Discord, when recording starts and stops, it posts a message in the text channel and plays an audio announcement in the voice channel. Speaker identification is based on matching voice activity to audio tracks, not on comparing voice samples to identify a person — this has been confirmed for Discord; the mechanism for Google Meet and Teams (a single mixed stream) has not yet been verified. We only record Meetings you have knowingly invited the Notetaker to. You can share a Recording (summary, transcript and playback) with named people; sharing happens only on your instruction, and the recipient sees the content after signing in to an account with a confirmed e-mail address. We do not track whether or when a recipient opened the message or played the Recording.

What we do not do: we do not obtain consent from participants on your behalf — the Notetaker’s visibility and the chat notice support, but do not replace, your obligation to obtain consent. We do not verify that you actually obtained consent from every participant before recording began — we have no way to do so. We do not determine which legal regime applies to your specific Meeting — this guide provides general rules, not an assessment of your situation. We do not record Meetings you have not invited the Notetaker to. We do not verify that sharing a Recording with a named person is covered by the information given to, and the consents of, the participants — that is your responsibility; when you inform participants about the recording (item 6), also tell them whether the Recording may be shared with people outside the Meeting. On Discord, the text message requires the server to grant the Notetaker permission to send messages — check this in the server settings.

8. High-risk situations

Situation	Recommendation
Privileged communications (attorney-client, physician-patient, journalist-source)	Do not record without the consents and safeguards required by applicable law and professional rules — consult a lawyer before recording.
HR, disciplinary, or recruitment conversations	Power imbalance means consent may not be freely given — consider whether recording is necessary, and if so, rely on a basis other than consent and clearly inform the participant.
Meetings involving minors	Consent from a parent or legal guardian is required; do not rely on the minor’s own consent.
Sales calls recorded by both parties	Confirm the other party knows you are also recording — undisclosed double recording carries the same risks as recording without consent.
Public meetings and webinars	Where attendance is voluntary and recording is disclosed at registration or entry, consent to attend typically covers consent to record — state this explicitly regardless.
Conversations involving health or other sensitive data	See Section 3.5 (GDPR) and Section 4 (BIPA, Illinois) above — you need a basis beyond consent to record.
Recording to monitor employees	We discourage this. Beyond the consent problem above, evaluating employees based on automated analysis of recorded conversations approaches practices that may be prohibited in the workplace under the EU AI Act (Art. 5, emotion recognition) — Algopulse does not perform such analysis, and it should not be added on top of our recordings using separate tools.

9. Consequences of non-compliance

Recording without required consent is not merely a technical lapse. Depending on the jurisdiction, it may result in: criminal liability (a crime in some U.S. states); statutory damages and class actions (certain state statutes, including BIPA in Illinois, allow private plaintiffs to recover statutory damages, often through class litigation); administrative liability in the EU (a supervisory authority may impose a fine for processing personal data without a legal basis); civil claims by participants for violation of privacy or data protection rights; unusability of the recording as evidence in legal proceedings; and contractual consequences — a violation of this guide and the Terms of Service is a material breach that may result in suspension or termination of your Account (Section 6, Terms of Service US).

10. Checklist before recording

• I disclosed the recording in the meeting invitation.
• I asked everyone for consent at the start of the meeting and waited for confirmation.
• Consent was captured (in the recording or in chat).
• I understand that the Notetaker’s visibility alone does not substitute for obtaining consent.
• I checked whether this meeting falls into one of the high-risk situations in Section 8 above.
• If someone joined late, I confirmed their consent separately.
• If someone declined, I turned off recording for them or for the whole meeting.
• When in doubt, I consulted a lawyer before recording.

11. Legal disclaimer

This guide is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. It reflects the legal position as of the verification date stated at the top of this document — the law, particularly U.S. state consent statutes, changes, and case law is not always consistent. Before relying on this guide, especially in a situation described in Section 8, consult a lawyer qualified in your jurisdiction. Algopoetica sp. z o.o. is not responsible for decisions made solely on the basis of this guide.