Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] Employee Privacy, Employer Policy

[Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On Fri, 3 Nov 2006, Stephen Montgomery-Smith wrote:

> Jerry Gamblin wrote:
>
> > This article looks at two recent court cases where a government 
> > employee's reasonable expectation of privacy was more important than 
> > the employer's ability to read any employee's e-mail - despite a 
> > privacy policy that clearly stated any company e-mail can, and will, be 
> > monitored.
> >
> > http://www.securityfocus.com/print/columnists/421
> >
> > So what does this do to most acceptable use policies? Does it make them 
> > useless if even a military AUP won't stand up in a military court?
>
> I quickly looked at the military case.  While I completely agree with 
> you that this is a bad decision, I can understand the legal quagmire 
> that they were in.  The computers were searched by the military police, 
> and there is a sense in which they are not acting as the employer, but 
> as the police force. As such, they are held to a higher standard whereby 
> they have to get search warrants, etc, etc.  I have heard it said that 
> difficult legal cases lead to bad law.  Of course I am not a lawyer, but 
> I am guessing that this is one of those situations.
>
> But overall, I do see the point you are trying to make.


> From the article:

  "the banner relied upon by the military judge to find no privacy
  expectation may have limited [Long's] expectation of privacy with regard
  to non-law enforcement monitoring of the computer system, but that the
  seizure of the e-mails in this case was for law enforcement purposes."

It seems to me that an employee who knows that his employer might read his 
email will be writing better emails (at least better from the perspective 
of the employer), but that's about all the good it does the employer.  If 
an employee knows his messages can be read, how many messages about 
criminal activity is he going to write?  The legal issues don't seem very 
important to me, partly for the reason just stated, but also because it is 
clear that an employer can have a policy that he may read emails, and if 
he does so with some regularity, there will be no "expectation of privacy" 
and no problems in court.  If the employer goes for years without reading 
a message, an expectation of privacy might be claimed.  So, note to 
employers: read more emails!

Mike

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