• Home
  • About
    • Official Bio
    • Podcast
  • Work with Belinda
    • PRIVACY CONSULTING
    • STRATEGY COACHING
    • Resources
  • Community
  • Speaking Calendar
  • Blog
    • Empowerment
    • Cyber Privacy & Security Awareness
    • Entrepreneurship
      • Digital Strategy
      • Personal Branding
      • Social Media
    • Devotions
    • Data Privacy & Protection
  • Contact
    • Weekly Newsletter

Can an employer monitor personal email?

April 29, 2012 Belinda Enoma 1 Comment

4-29-12

What does your corporate electronic communications or Internet Use policy say? Is it in plain English? Is it detailed?


  • Employers, it’s time to change, amend or update your corporate electronic communications policy or face risks and perhaps, lose a lot of money.
  • Employees, read that policy document very well.

I recently read a case Stengart v. Loving Care Agency, Inc., 2009 N.J. Super. LEXIS 143 (App.Div. June 26, 2009) about whether an employer had the right to review ex-employee’s personal emails retrieved via computer forensics. Apparently, before the plaintiff resigned from her job, she had sent private and confidential emails to her attorney using office computer but via her own personal (Yahoo) email account; did not store the password on the computer and the defendant (former employer) used them in the discovery process while responding to her lawsuit. The court held that the emails were protected by the attorney-client privilege even though they were sent using company computer because it was her personal Yahoo account that had a password (and the emails clearly stated that they were private and confidential). Therefore, she reasonably expected them to be private.

Food for thought:
  • Does an employee have a reasonable expectation of privacy when using company computer?
  • Isn’t expectation of privacy different from expectation of confidentiality?

Employers, take note.

Does your electronic communications policy permit occasional personal use? If your electronic communications or Internet Use policy states that emails can be monitored at anytime, does it include personal emails sent via personal and password-protected emails?

Your Ethics and Compliance team should ensure that the use of emerging technology, emails or new media is spelled out in your electronic communications policy. It will cost you more in the long run if you don’t mention the actual electronic device e.g. BlackBerry, iPhone, Droid, Skype  or the social media platform, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, etc. You have to spell it out and include blogs, tweets, IMs, BB messages and whatever lingo is being used.

Employees, understand this.

There has been an increase in employee job terminations due to nonchalant, in some cases deliberate and profane social media posts by employees and an increase in lawsuits filed by former employees. The winner = dicey. For the employee, it may appear too extreme when employers block access to social media platforms like YouTube or Facebook in the work place. However, for the employer, ‘we are simply just protecting our interests and reducing any risks to liability and managing our reputation.’

READ NEXT POST  Why You Should Not Give An Employer Your Facebook Password

Can an employer monitor personal email? It depends. Even if you use your personal email account to send emails on company computer, they can still be read if retrieved by computer forensics (even if you deleted them), with reasonable expectation of privacy or not.

Liked this article? Read some more:

One Thing You Should Do Before You Publish Your App
The Data Privacy Issue with Visitor Management Software
3 Simple Steps to Ensure Data Privacy in the Cloud
Big Data and Analytics: What I Observed at #BigDataAtWork
Belinda Enoma
Belinda Enoma

Belinda is a Global Privacy and Cybersecurity Consultant, Corporate Trainer, Writer, and International Speaker with a unique blend of law and technology expertise. In addition, she is a digital entrepreneur, ordained pastor, mentor to women ready to impact their generation. She is the host of Destiny Chats podcast and lives in New York with her family. For consultation , click here 

Data Privacy privacy in the workplace



Comments

  1. Nena says

    May 12, 2012 at 7:36 AM

    We need constant reminders like this. Good one!

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

LATEST PODCAST EPISODES

Some Posts You Missed..

  • Multipotentiality: Should You Choose or Pursue Diverse Interests?
  • I Have Hosted Several Conferences and I Share 5 Things Every Speaker Should Know
  • No More Excuses This Year!
  • It’s Action Time (And We Aren’t Holding Back This Year)
  • Belinda Enoma is Miss Hall’s School 2022 Commencement Speaker
  • Value Your Brilliance – Masterclass for Women Ready to Turn Pain to Gain
  • 8 Affirmations to Help You Navigate Life
  • Belinda Enoma Joins ISACA Conference North America 2022 as SheLeadsTech Keynote


*Affiliate links

© 2022 · Belinda Enoma · Privacy Policy · Copyright · Disclosures

This website uses cookies to give you the best experience. You can find out more here

Powered by  GDPR Cookie Compliance
Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.