April 15 news — Paying to work out only to end up in a livestream? "Speechless — I was livestreamed while eating out." "Getting a haircut and being shown on a livestream — is that reasonable?" … Have you ever encountered these scenarios where businesses livestream and you "get caught on camera"? With the integration of online and offline consumption scenarios, some businesses have taken it upon themselves to livestream consumers' real consumption scenes for traffic and marketing, and consumers' annoyance is rising sharply.

　　Searching with "being livestreamed" as the keyword, the reporter found many such complaints on social platforms: "So annoying!", "No right to privacy", "I'm really fed up", "Very irritating" … Some netizens explicitly stated, "I don't want my life livestreamed in real time."

　　Why livestream these scenes? The reporter interviewed Mr. Jin, who works in the livestreaming industry. Mr. Jin said it is mainly because platform rules "encourage" outdoor scenes. Moreover, the more people in the scene, the easier it is to obtain preferential traffic allocation from the platform. "I work in real estate livestreaming. Company leaders like us to broadcast scenes of crowded sales offices, which also brings platform traffic. The same goes for the catering and bathing industries — filming consumption scenes makes the place look lively; you could say it uses herd mentality to convert more customers."

　　"As long as it is for commercial use, the consent of the person concerned should be obtained, and ideally an agreement should be signed," said Lawyer Liu Jian of Jiangsu Zhenyu Law Firm. "When businesses film and use footage of consumers or visitors for commercial promotion without permission, they infringe on the individual's portrait rights."

　　According to Article 1019 of the Civil Code of the People's Republic of China, no organization or individual may infringe on another person's portrait rights by means of vilification, defacement, or forgery using information technology. Without the consent of the portrait rights holder, no one may produce, use, or publicly disclose the portrait of the rights holder, except as otherwise provided by law. Without the consent of the portrait rights holder, the owner of the portrait work may not use or publicly disclose the portrait of the rights holder by means of publication, reproduction, distribution, rental, exhibition, or otherwise.

　　Liu Jian stated that even where direct economic benefit is not involved, it still constitutes an infringement of individual rights, and the person filmed has the right to demand that the business stop the infringing act. If the business's conduct causes mental distress or other economic loss to the person concerned, the person may claim compensation from the business in accordance with the law. If members of the public have already encountered such a situation, it is recommended that they first communicate with the business and demand that it stop using the relevant footage and remove the relevant content. Once the business refuses to cooperate, the person concerned may seek legal assistance.

　　The reporter then interviewed the Jiangsu Provincial Consumers Council. A staff member of the council said that it is understandable for businesses to "attract customers and drive traffic" through physical consumption scenes, but the content they display could be clean and tidy kitchen counters, professional and responsible fitness coaches, or smooth and skillful haircutting techniques. Exposing uninformed consumers to public view and using them as a marketing gimmick is by no means appropriate. After all, the normalization of livestreaming does not mean everyone should accept the camera's "gaze."

　　Some businesses, without obtaining consumers' consent, livestream scenes such as fitness and dining in which consumers' personal images are prominent, and use them for commercial promotion. This effectively turns consumers into traffic-generation tools or free advertisements, blurring the boundary between a business's operational autonomy and consumers' lawful rights and interests. While suspected of infringing on consumers' portrait rights, it may also leak consumers' location privacy and facial information, bringing uncertain risks. Personal profile features such as facial features, fingerprint information, and movement trajectories are highly susceptible to capture; once exploited by lawbreakers, they will cause harm to consumers' personal and property safety.

　　In this regard, the Jiangsu Provincial Consumers Council recommends that businesses properly handle the relationship between their own interest needs in commercial marketing and consumers' rights claims, and that innovative marketing methods or promotional traffic-generation activities follow the principles of legality and reasonableness. Before livestreaming for traffic generation or similar acts, they should fully inform consumers of the content to be filmed, the purpose, and the scope of use, and obtain consumers' consent. Consumers should strengthen their awareness of risk prevention.

　　At the same time, relevant platforms should also strengthen the review of content in consumption scenes where consumers' personal images are prominent, refine and improve internal platform management rules, and promptly disconnect livestreams or take down relevant videos where infringement of others' lawful rights and interests is suspected; when necessary, they may also impose penalties such as restricting push notifications or banning accounts.