Europe court backs employee fired over private messages
Europe court backs employee fired over private messages
By Christian SPILLMANN with Adam Plowright in Paris September
5, 2017
Strasbourg (France) (AFP) - Europe's top rights court on
Tuesday restricted the ability of employers to snoop on their staff's private
messages, in a landmark ruling with wide ramifications for privacy in the
workplace.
The highest body of the European Court of Human Rights
(ECHR) ruled in favour of a 38-year-old Romanian man who claimed his rights had
been violated when he was sacked in 2007 for sending private chat messages in
the office.
Bogdan Mihai Barbulescu has fought a 10-year legal battle
through Romanian and European courts, claiming his privacy was infringed when
his employer accessed intimate exchanges with his fiancee and brother.
In a first ruling in January last year, the ECHR found
that the snooping was allowed because employers were justified in wanting to
verify "that employees were completing their professional tasks during
working hours".
But in a review, the 17 most senior judges at the court
based in Strasbourg, France, found Tuesday that Romanian courts "had not
adequately protected Mr Barbulescu's right to respect for his private life and
correspondence".
In a written judgement, backed by 11 votes to six, they
found that previous court rulings had "failed to strike a fair balance
between the interests at stake", namely the company's right to check on
employees and employees' right to privacy.
The judges also found that "an employer's
instructions could not reduce private social life in the workplace to
zero", meaning that some use of the internet at work for personal reasons
was justified.
The ruling will become law in the 47 countries that have
ratified the European Convention on Human Rights, meaning some members will
have to adjust their national legislation.
Barbulescu's lawyer Emeric Domokos-Hancu said the ruling
was a "ray of light" for his client.
"In reality, it represents much more -- the fact
that man's private life does not stop at the door to his workplace," he
added.
- Sex life exposed -
The case revolved around messages sent in 2007 by
Barbulescu over the Yahoo messaging platform, which the software engineer was
required to use by his bosses to liaise with clients.
He was sacked after his employer accused him of using
company resources for personal reasons, which violated company policy, and
produced 45 pages of his private messages to his fiancee and brother as proof.
Barbulescu argued that his employer had invaded his right
to privacy by using spyware to access the chat material, which included details
about his health and sex life.
In their judgement on the court's website, the ECHR
judges said Tuesday that it was unclear whether Barbulescu had been warned
about the monitoring or the risk of the messages being read without his
authorisation.
It also said that Romanian courts had failed to determine
why the monitoring measures were justified and whether there were other ways of
checking on him "entailing less intrusion" into his private life.
The judges held a hearing on November 30 last year, at
which they heard arguments from experts and the European Trade Union
Confederation.
The union group had criticised the initial ruling,
judging it to be too harsh.
It recommended that a verbal warning should be the first
stage of any disciplinary process with dismissal only possible for repeat
offenders or serious misconduct.
Experts also say companies should also have a clear
policy governing the use of professional software and the internet during work
hours.
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