Can My Employer Read My Email?
By Ashley Gurdon and Michael A. Goldstein
An employee should never assume that they're
emails that are sent and received, are kept in complete privacy
from their employers. Under the Electronic Communications
Privacy Act (ECPA) it provides for implied authorization to
review employee emails, and that a company should state their
policy of monitoring e-mails in the company handbook. However,
pursuant to Title III of the ECPA, it unlawful for anyone
to intentionally intercept any email communication while it
is en route. ECPA 18 USC 2701.
Since new technologies are ever growing, employers now have
the options to monitor their employees when they use their
phone, computer terminals, emails, voicemails and even when
an employee is using the internet. Unless the employee's company
policy states otherwise, an employer may listen, watch and
read most of the communications conducted by an employee during
the course of their work day.
Recent surveys have shown that a majority of employers monitor
their employee's activity. More specifically, in a 2005 survey
conducted by the American Management Association, it was found
that three fourths of employers monitor the websites their
employee's visit in order to prevent inappropriate surfing.
The survey further fold that 65% of employers use software
to block connections to websites deemed off limits to employees.
One third of employers monitor their employee's number of
key strokes and the amount of time spent on the keyboard and
lastly just over half of the employers surveyed review and
retain email messages.
Most of the time, E-mail is not considered private if the
email system is used at a company, the employer owns it and
is allowed to review its contents. As such, an employee generally
do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their email
communications. Email messages that are sent within the company,
as well as those that are sent from the employee's terminal
to another company, or from another company to the employee
are subject to monitoring. These email messages include those
from yahoo, hotmail, AOL, as well as instant messages. If
an email is deleted out of the employees account, that doesn't
mean that they are totally deleted. The messages are retained
in memory even after they have been deleted. Emails are often
permanently backed up along with other important data from
the computer system. If the employer's email system has an
option for the employee to mark their email messages as private
in most cases this doesn't always protect the emails and ensure
that they are actually kept private. If an employer's email
policy specifically states that messages marked as "private"
will be keep confidential, however there may also be some
exceptions to that policy.
In order for an employee to know their employer's email policy,
they should read over the employee handbook. If the handbook
doesn't address the issue of email monitoring, an employee
should speak with their employer about their policy for emails
and privacy.
Currently there are very few laws that address workplace
privacy; however there are some organizations that are working
to advocate for employees so that there will be a stronger
government regulation of employee monitoring activities. Some
of these organizations include; National Work Rights Institute,
Workplace Fairness, Workplace Fairness is affiliated with
the National Employment Lawyers Association.
The forgoing article on employee rights was written by Ashley
Grudon for the
Law Office of Goldstein and Clegg, LLC
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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