Re: email monitoring

Mike Monroe wrote:
On 30 Aug 2006 05:33:58 -0700, "brightwell"
<brightwell_151@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I'm aware of court cases where companies have been fined for:
Harassment or Discrimination in the workplace (allowing offensive
emails to be sent)
Defamantory statements or Libel (allowing staff to send emails
including defamatory comments about antoher party)

I'm not aware of any case law from the other side of the fence - has
any employee taken their company to court for monitoring of email
(presumably personal email). Anyone aware of such a case? Are the
details in the public domain (I'm interested to see what the employer
did wrong)

Note: This isn't a case brewing - I want to detail the risks. I work
for a company who doesn't object to the personal use of it's systems
(including email) by staff as long as this is considered and
reasonable. The company does have a strict policy for the use of email
on it's systems and it makes it clear that this policy applies to any
email handled by the system (personal or business). I don't see how we
can distinguish between work and personal - and I don't see that we
should, we are just as liable in the event that the "personal"
recipient is offended by the email and decides to take action against
us (becasue it was produced on our system)... Aren't we?

Brightwell

It's very easy to distinguish between company and personal emails if
you really want to. If the email mentions or concerns your employer's
business then it's a company email, anything else is personal.

If a company has told it's employees that email use is monitored then it is unlikely that any employee could take the employer to court for 'monitoring' email. Another thing to remember is that email monitoring does not necessarily mean going in and reading employees email, whether it is business related or not. We have tools which monitor the amount of email sent by individuals which may in itself flag a potential issue, only then would we delve deeper and investigate content.

I would say it is imperative these days that any company that has an email system should have an accompanying email acceptable use policy - and that staff have access to it. This policy should state whether or not 'personal use' it permitted (and yes, I am aware of article 8 of the human rights act)

In my experience, my organisation has such a policy and it states that 'email is a business tool' - and that 'all email use is monitored and should not be considered private'.

Now, in reality - even if we had cause to investigate email abuse we would be extremely careful about who and what was 'checked', for example, I advise my people not to open and email if it is obviously personal unless it is necessary as part of the investigation!! - ultimately though, the organisation is permitted to do this because the policy has stated it.

Happy to assist more as I've got background in this, and I've been involved in actual cases. IANAL though.

J
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: email monitoring
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  • RE: Internet E-mail monitoring/approval
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  • RE: Internet E-mail monitoring/approval
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  • RE: Internet E-mail monitoring/approval
    ... I believe what you were saying is true, if you were a Law Enforcement ... What "SCOPE" do you have to define?? ... monitoring policies and investigation policies. ... previously mentioned triggers or a very good suspicion about employee ...
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