Hidden cameras in public bathrooms 'disturbing'

How often do you use a public restroom?

Between work, school, restaurants, bars, movie theaters, shopping malls, casinos and more, I'd guess several times a week for most of us.

How often do you look around those public restrooms to see if you are being recorded? Any cameras hidden in vents, toilet paper holders, paper towel dispensers, lights? How about the electric socket? You'd be surprised where cameras can be hidden these days. Is that air freshener really an air freshener? And how about that odd-looking smoke detector?

Anything you can see while you are taking care of your business, can "see" you and is a potential hiding place for a camera

As a man, I don't generally think about someone recording me in the bathroom. Not to say someone wouldn't and hasn't, but men just don't worry about it being a problem.

But it's a different story for women, one brought home to me this past week after one of my nieces, a student at the University of Delaware, posted a link on her Facebook page to the university's website. The link was to the story about the now-former grad student who police say was hiding cameras in bathrooms at the university over the past two years.

Her comment above the link was a simple one: This is really disturbing.

"Extremely disturbing" is how UD President Patrick Harker put it.

Seeing that Facebook post from my niece made me realize that something I've never really worried about – being secretly recorded in the bathroom – is now a very real concern for her and the thousands of other women at UD.

They must all be wondering if they were one of the hundreds of potential victims caught on camera. Did they ever use any of the bathrooms where cameras were hidden?

"Extremely disturbing," indeed.

Authorities have found no evidence Javier Mendiola-Soto, 38 – whose student visa has been revoked – shared any of the more than 1,500 video files that have been seized or posted them on the Internet, but that doesn't make it any less disturbing.

UD is not the only place this has happened. It's all over. A bathhouse at a state park in Connecticut, a Starbucks in Texas, a bathroom at the University of Iowa. The list goes on – unfortunately.

So the next time you go to do a little business in the restroom, you may just want to take a look around. If you can see it, it has the potential to see you.

Share in the Only in Delaware conversation 24/7 on delawareonline. Contact Jeffrey Gentry at jgentry@delawareonline.com. Follow him on Twitter: @jeffreygentry