This paper discusses the privacy rights of employers and employees, which are becoming even more important due to technological advances.
This paper explains that the right to privacy is a very complex subject stemming from the protection provided by the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable search and seizure and is often at issue when employers are challenged in court. The author, reviewing AT&T Wireless’s guidebook, indicates that the company reserves the right to monitor, obtain, review, copy, store, and disclose all information, content, and data used, stored, or maintained on the company’s system, including, but not limited to, e-mail and voice mail messages, intranet sites, and Internet access. The paper relates that employers monitor the activities of their employees because employers may be liable for misconduct of employees, and causes for low productivity may be discovered by surveillance.
“Large companies such as AT&T Wireless realize they need to create a privacy policy in order to protect propriety information and most importantly employee data. In order to ensure that employees are aware of their privacy rights, many companies such as AT&T Wireless distributes a yearly colleague guidebook. This guidebook gives specific information on several privacy topics, including the actions the company can take to review company property if they feel you are abusing the use of it. The guidebook discloses the following: “E-mail, voice mail, intranet/intranet use access is for authorized business use only. The company retains the right to monitor and to electronically limit access to certain sites in its sole discretion.” “.