Apple Store Spy Cam Artist Under Investigation By Secret Service

A recent video posted by digital artist Kyle McDonald has garnered a lot of attention that could be getting the artist into some serious trouble. The artistic project is called People Staring At Computers, which McDonald compiled by installing spy cam software on various display Macs in two New York Apple Store locations. To watch the video, continue after the cut.

McDonald installed spy cam software on Apple Store Macs to take periodic photos of customers staring at the monitors. Thousands of photos of people staring blankly and looking generally bored were then compiled with music and an artistic message. The project may have meant well as some sort of study on the current human state of being with technology, but to the majority of people it's outright creepy and invasive.

"I thought maybe we could see ourselves doing this we would think more about our computers and how we're using them," said McDonald. "We have this expression on our face [when we use computers] that basically says that we're not interacting with anybody, we're interacting with the machine."

Apple wipes all their display machines each night, meaning McDonald had to go back everyday to reinstall the software. More brazenly, he even set up an unauthorized "exhibition" where he played the pictures on the Apple Store machines while customers were using them.

Apple has already begun to take action against McDonald, although it's not clear yet what exactly they plan to do. The United States Secret Service has also begun investigating McDonald and have confiscated his personal computers.

[via Mashable]