Employers' EMail Monitoring

The fact that the internet and computer usage is now world-wide and many workplaces consist of the use of computers and other means of Information technology, it is obvious that there will be people taking advantage of their usage of access to computers. There are several reasons why employers may legally prevent personal usage of emails by their employees. Among such reasons is the fact it is time taken away from the task the employees are paid to perform. And second there is always the possibility of divulging privileged information, no matter how inadvertently or innocently. There seems to be little legal precedent for such restrictions violating employee privacy.

So, employers may legally be able to restrict employee use of e-mails. "Courts have found that employers are generally free to read employee email messages, as long as there's a valid business purpose for doing so…These days, many companies reinforce these rights by adopting email policies telling employees that their email isn't private and that the company is monitoring email messages. Some companies also require employees to sign a form acknowledging that their email isn't private" (Guerin 2011, Para 4-5).

To some employees using emails for personal messages ought to be not merely private but free from intrusion by management. There are a good number of employees world-wide who surely feel that emailing someone on company time is no more serious than, say, taking a few pencils or paperclips. They would be wrong. And the law, at least in the U.S. says it is wrong for private emailing during business hours. "In a 9-0 ruling, the justices rejected a broad right of privacy for workers and said a supervisor may read through a public employee's text messages if he or she suspects that work rules are being violated" (Savage, 2010, p. 5). There have been ample occasions where so-called private texting or emails have brought down publicity and denunciations due to inadvertent comments in messages deemed to be "private."

The particular case decided by the Court unanimously actually was brought under the Fourth Amendment right that makes unreasonable searches and seizures illegal. The court obviously decided that monitoring and reading emails sent by employees is not unreasonable. It is also a fact that emails sent by employees can also contain information useful to management in the case of employee legal actions, such as claiming sexual or gender or ethnic harassment. It should be a necessity for an employer to know and understand the feelings, motivations and actions of his employees when such communication is done supposedly privately- but on company time.

The fact is, with the internet and Ipods and androids, there is little that is private anymore, except perhaps the confessional in the Catholic Church. One recent example of misuse of emails on company time was the chief executive of th4 Boeing Corp., who was asked to resign because of some private emails he sent to another executive which were obviously disparaging.

Monitoring of emails is more important than ever because texting and electronic communication is now often the basis for most businesses and having such devices handy becomes a lure for private use: "According to a 2010 workplace privacy study by Ponemon Institute, a Traverse City, Mich., data-security research firm, 42% of full-time employees in the workplace with a company-assigned email account 'frequently use' it for personal communications and another 29% 'sometimes' do" (Mantell, 2010, p. 3). The article explains that these private users are not evil and not necessarily inclined to anything truly illegal. However, they are doing private things on company time, which merits attention and monitoring. Ms. Mantell (2010) suggests that employees need to understand that there will be records of their texts so that nothing is securely private and confidential." "As a general matter, most employees know that a company's IT department has access to all emails, that emails are typically backed up or saved, and that emails might be subject to review as part of general IT management or in connection with a litigation or legal process" (Mantell, 2010, p. 3).

Employers, especially those in sensitive areas, use sophisticated software for monitoring. This goes well beyond merely trying to listen in to a phone conversation or looking over an employee's shoulder at his workstation: "Most employers use special software to identify the messages that use specific terms. Some of these keywords are technical and relate to a company's trade secrets. Employers read these messages to see if anyone is leaking proprietary information to a competitor" (Maltby, 2010, p. 4).

One other reason why employers should have the legal right to monitor workplace emails is that the equipment belongs to the employer. It is, in a sense, like making a ruling that the use of company cars is limited to company business and not to taking the kids to school or running to the local McDonalds. The key, for any and all rules as set forth by management, ought to be in an employee manual, or, in a smaller business, posted on a bulletin board so that no one can plead ignorance. And for those employees who defend their occasional private emails by claiming it doesn't really "cost anything" forget that private business on company time is costing the employer their services no matter how short that private time might actually be.

References:

Guerin, L. (2011): "Email Monitoring: Can Your Employer Read

Your Messages? You probably have no right to privacy in

your work email account." Accessed Oct. 23, 2011 on

www.nolo.com/.../email-monitoring-can-employer-read-

30088.html

Maltby, L. (2010): " Perils in the Workplace in the Internet Age"

Privacy Journal vol. 36. No. 3 (Jan 2010): pp. 3-4

Mantell, R., (2010): "Market Watch: Watch your Emails; Your

Boss does" Wall Street Journal , May 2, 2010, p. 5

Savage, D.: (2010): "Court rules for employer over texting

Privacy" Buffalo NY: Buffalo News , June 18, 2010 p. 5