Yacht snooping

PALMA
THE Balearics is a super yacht haven during the summer as the world's rich and famous cruise the Mediterranean's most popular and fashionable ports but superrich yacht owners are starting to object to the small army of super-yacht spotters which are not only posting photographs of their luxury yachts on the Internet, but also all the inside information about the luxuries fitted on board.

Yacht spotters have sprung into operation all over the world with special attention paid to mega-yachts like the Majorca-based Lady Moura.
All of the super yacht's secrets have been posted on the internet.
Tatoosh and Octopus both owned by the Microsoft founder Paul Allen, are annual visitors to Balearic waters and favourites for yacht spotters who are using the internet to pass on the latest locations and information about the top super-yachts so their fellow spotters can track the vessels as the cruise round the world.

I have to admit, the new yacht spotters' websites provide helpful information from media point of view. The websites enable us to identify new arrivals in the Balearics and their owners and access interesting details about the yachts in question.

However, the mega wealthy and, in some cases super-powerful, yacht owners are not happy with the growing amount of intrusion. Ironically, many of the super-yacht crews have to sign confidentially agreements as part of their contract and clients taking the yachts out on charter often demand that the crew sign a fresh set of confidentially agreements to cover the duration of their particular cruise.

The crew on board the yacht chartered by Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman when they visited the Balearics was forced to sign confidentially agreements which also instructed them on how they were expected to behave and when to be seen.

But, much of that confidentially is being broken down by yacht spotters who are watching every move on board the super yachts and taking pictures without the owners' permission.

SECURITY
Some of the more private owners are also worried about the security breaches yacht spotters could be making by posting structural and technical information about the yachts on the world wide web, never mind their locations. That said, if they want a private life, then don't buy a super yacht.