Photo/Illutration Princess Kako arrives at the Brazilian federal parliament building in Brasilia on June 11. (Sayuri Ide)

Video footage of Princess Kako snoozing during a recent flight in Brazil left the Imperial Household Agency fuming and asking what possible interest is served by such a blatant intrusion into her privacy.

Naomasa Yoshida, the grand master of the crown prince’s household at the agency, said at a June 13 news conference, “In general, it is not desirable to have videos taken without permission during an individual’s private moments.”

Kako is the second daughter of Crown Prince Fumihito and Crown Princess Kiko. Her uncle is Emperor Naruhito. She is visiting Brazil for events to mark the 130th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

Agency official said the video posted to X around June 12 showed Kako and several agency officials boarding a commercial flight in Brazil. The video goes on to capture the 30-year-old princess dozing off at her seat.

The agency disclosed June 13 that it had asked the operator of X, formerly known as Twitter, to look into whether the video violated the company’s guidelines.

The site, in principle, bans the sharing of video footage taken without permission.

Based on the content of the video, an official with the Imperial Household Agency’s Public Relations Office said it was highly unlikely that the princess gave permission for the footage to be taken.

Kako left Japan on June 4 and has been using commercial flights in Brazil to visit eight cities. She is scheduled to return to Japan on June 17.

LAWYER’S OPINION  

Yuichi Nakazawa, a lawyer who is well-versed in legal matters concerning the internet and social media, said privacy issues inevitably come into play when footage is taken of an individual and posted without the person’s permission.

But since the video was taken on a plane, and a commercial flight at that, he said the issue of private space is a nonstarter in legal terms, meaning it would be difficult to prove any violation had occurred.

Moreover, in this celebrity obsessed age it can be argued that postings of a person in the public eye serve the public interest, Nakazawa added.

However, he qualified that by saying a video of an individual sleeping during a flight in Brazil was on a different level than if the individual had been dozing during a public event or perhaps a Diet session.

“I can’t see that there was a great need to post the video, so my gut feeling is that there is a good chance it violated her rights,” Nakazawa said.

Members of the imperial family may not have the right to vote, but they do have the right to privacy and not having their portrait taken, he added.

When a person feels their privacy rights have been violated in such circumstances, they can seek to have the photo or video deleted, ask the platform operator to reveal who posted the image and even seek compensation for damages.

But it would be up to the princess to make such a claim for compensation, not the Imperial Household Agency, he said.

(This article was written by Ayako Nakada and Ryota Goto.)

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