European judges have ruled that employers are entitled to read private communications sent using an employer’s IT system over the internet during work hours.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled that a company that read an employee's messages sent through Yahoo Messenger while he was at work were within their rights to do so.
The ruling comes as a result of Barbulescu v Romania, in which an employee (Barbulescu) set up a Yahoo Messenger account for professional use and to communicate on behalf of his employers. When he established the account, he had been notified that his communications could be monitored. He was later dismissed after he was found to be breaching use of this account.
Despite claiming that he had only used the internet for professional purposes, records showed that he had used the Internet for personal purposes, contrary to the organisation’s policy.
Breach of Workplace Policy
As a result of the personal use of the internet, Barbulescu was dismissed for breaching company policy. He took the case to the European Court of Human Rights claiming that his employer was in breach of human rights law and in particular, his right to privacy. However, the court ruled that his right under Article 8 of the European Convention of Human Rights had not been breached because a ”fair balance had been struck between Barbulescu’s right to respect for his private life and correspondence and his employer’s interests.”
As part of the defence, his employers showed the court a 45-page transcript between Barbulescu’s wife which detailed many private issues showing that he had breached the rules of his workplace.
The court ruled that the employer had acted within the context of a formal disciplinary procedure and Barbulescu had used Yahoo Messenger on the company’s computer during working hours.
While some media outlets have claimed that this ruling shows that employers can “snoop” on employees, the case goes no further than confirming that communications sent by an employee using the employer’s IT systems can be monitored without breaching the employee’s right to privacy. The case also highlights the danger of social media, messenger and other communication platforms in the workplace.
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