Canada: Employer Breached Employee's Right To Privacy By Reviewing Private Messages Sent From Work Laptop [telecom]

open original image

by James Cook

Employees frequently use laptop computers provided to them by their employer for personal matters as well as employment-related tasks. To what extent can an employer review private messages sent from an employee's personal social media accounts if they are available on the shared computer?

As someone who has been employed to "tune" SpamAssassin filers, I can tell you that the great majority of corporate email should have been deleted before it was sent: not only do users give no thought to security or confidentiality, they also routinely offer opinions about the fashion|sexual|eating|dating|scheduling habits of their cow-orkers, along with sexist|racist|misogynistic|ignorant opinions about their friends, their national leaders, their football club, and/or their neighborhood swingers.

When I become king, I will order that everyone with access to a computer be forced to read and re-read every email they ever sent, so as to inculcate a sense of caution and balance with regard to what they send off into the ether.

Bill Horne Moderator