Is it legal to record this call?

Usually, yes, if you’re a participant in the call. Federal US law and 36 states allow you to record a conversation you’re part of without the other side agreeing. The other 14 states require every participant to consent. Outside the US, the rules are stricter: the EU, UK, and Canada generally require you to tell people at the start of the call. Read the rest of this page to know which rules apply to your call.

This page is a plain-language summary, not legal advice. When the answer matters, check with a lawyer in the relevant jurisdiction.

The federal Wiretap Act (18 U.S.C. § 2511) permits a person to record a conversation they are participating in without the other party’s consent, so long as the recording isn’t for a criminal or tortious purpose. This is the “one-party consent” baseline. States can and do go further.

In these states, every participant on the call has to agree before you record. Some have specific definitions of what counts as a private conversation; the safest move in any of them is to say at the start of the call that you’re recording and get a yes.

• California
• Connecticut
• Delaware
• Florida
• Illinois
• Maryland
• Massachusetts
• Michigan
• Montana
• Nevada
• New Hampshire
• Oregon
• Pennsylvania
• Washington

A few states with quirks worth knowing:

• California:the Invasion of Privacy Act (Penal Code §§ 631, 632) carries statutory damages per violation; it is the hottest jurisdiction for recording litigation in the US.
• Massachusetts: the wiretap act turns on whether the recording is secret, not whether the participant had an expectation of privacy. If everyone can see you’re recording, you’re generally OK.
• Illinois:the eavesdropping statute applies to “private” conversations where a party has a reasonable expectation of privacy.

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press keeps a free state-by-state guide that is more detailed than what we can fit here.

Outside the US the bar is generally higher. Recordings that identify a person are personal data under the EU and UK GDPR, which means the recorder needs a lawful basis (usually consent) and has to give participants a privacy notice before the call.

Canada layers PIPEDA on top of Criminal Code section 184: one party’s consent satisfies the criminal side, but commercial recordings additionally require you to tell the other side at the start of the call.

If a conversation will touch on health, religion, political opinion, or other sensitive categories, EU and UK rules require explicit consent. Don’t rely on implied consent for those calls.

Kanab makes the recording posture as clean as we can on our side and leaves the consent decision to you. Concretely:

• No meeting bot.Kanab doesn’t join calls. It captures the audio your Mac is already playing or capturing, the same way QuickTime or a Dictaphone would. No third-party participant is added to the meeting.
• No cloud upload by default. Audio, transcripts, and summaries stay on your Mac. There is no copy on our servers we could be asked to hand over.
• On-device transcription. The model runs locally; the words never travel to a third-party speech service.
• Visible recording indicator. macOS shows a microphone dot in the menu bar whenever Kanab is recording, and Kanab itself displays a recording timer. Participants on videoconferences see the same indicators they always see for mic and screen-audio activity.

What Kanab does not do, and cannot do for you: obtain consent from the other people on your call. That part is on you.

The boring version of compliance is the one that scales:

• Tell people at the start of the call: “I’m recording this for my notes. OK with you?” A yes on the audio is the cleanest consent record you can have.
• For recurring meetings, get a one-time written agreement (email, calendar invite description). Once is enough for most jurisdictions; it’s plenty for your defense file either way.
• If you don’t know whether the other side’s jurisdiction is one-party or all-party, ask anyway. It’s a five-second conversation that closes the legal risk window.
• For workplaces, check your employer’s recording policy before turning Kanab on at work. Even where state law permits recording, employer policies can prohibit it, and enforceable disciplinary consequences may apply.
• Don’t use Kanab for covert recording where covert recording is illegal. Don’t use it to capture privileged communications you’re not entitled to. Don’t use it to harass anyone.

This page is general background to help you ask better questions. Laws change, case law moves, and your call may touch multiple jurisdictions at once. For a specific situation, talk to a lawyer. We’re happy to point you at resources we’ve found useful. Email hi@kanab.dev.