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the regulation of internet
the regulation of internet
is employers liability a tort
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Internet Rules, Laws and Regulations
Many of us use the internet on a daily basis and the expectation of using the internet is that our research and information is private. The reasons why we have expectations of privacy are due to the rules, laws and regulations set forth in the past by cases involving the use of the internet. The case of Smyth v. Pillsbury Co., 914 F.Supp 97 is a prime example of internet use at work and the privacy expectations. The Communications Decency Act of 1996 criminalizes sending or displaying offensive messages on the internet less than 18 years of age. The Economic Espionage Act criminalizes the theft of confidential business information.
Internet Rules, Laws and Regulations
The case of Smyth v. Pillsbury Co., 914 F.Supp 97 (E.D. Pa. 1996) is a prime example of internet use and the privacy expectations we assume while at work. When an employee uses email at work that is a company email account, the expectations by the employer is that this email is used for professional use only and the expectations by the employee is that their emails are private and confidential. In the Smyth v. Pillsbury Co., 914 F.Supp 97 (E.D. Pa. 1996), Michael Smyth got fired for sending an email message threatening to harm fellow employees.
“He was terminated for inappropriate and unprofessional comments over defendant’s email system. Courts ruled that Pillsbury had the right to prevent unprofessional and illegal activity out-weighted any privacy interest of its employee in email comments.” (Rustad, 2009, p. 230)
At my work, I have often heard from Directors that the email is for company use only, but this is not a rule that is enforced. It always surprises me when coworkers send silly messages or add their work email for their personal use like shopping or receiving coupons. I believe that with the use of smart phones, it is unnecessary to use work emails and there would be less time wasted at work if the emails were monitored more.
The Communications Decency Act of 1996 criminalizes sending or displaying offensive messages on the internet under the age of eighteen.
Under Agency law, an employer is liable for the torts of its employees and agents if the tort is committed within the scope of their duties. This concept, known as "respondeat superior" or "let the master respond," imposes liability even if the employer is blameless.
...e Court under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in Harris v. Forklift Systems, Inc. (1994), and the employer can be held vicariously liable under the standards of Burlington Industries, Inc. v. Ellerth (1998), so she should prevail in her case against her employer.
The Jaffee-Redmond ruling heavily impacted how all organizations and firms deal with staff members’ rights. Today, the legal human resource environment requires that all key organizational professionals know and understand the laws affected by this case. Prospective job candidates who are well-versed in these laws and similar issues can outmaneuver less knowledgeable candidates. Training in current privacy laws are a valuable asset in several settings, such as:
We have learned from Pillsbury v. Smyth, which is a similar case, that Joe could, in fact, be terminated for his actions. He could be terminated legally because there is no exception to the employer’s right to terminate an employee-at-will doctrine. His termination does not violate Public Policy. In the Smyth v. Pillsbury (1996) case, it was ruled that Smyth had no reasonable expectation of privacy because he was using a company computer. Joe was using a company computer to write the email, so there is no expectation of privacy either. In order to limit the liability of the company, termination of Joe would be the best step. The company should expect for Joe to follow through with the legal action, so they should be prepared to defend themselves in court. Joe will be jaded for being fired and possibly want revenge. As for the impact on operations, I would send out a memorandum that explains the privacy policy of the company, and the policy for criticizing customers. Letting people know what is expected this would limit the impact on
Abstract: Electronic mail is quickly becoming the most prevalent method of communication in the world. However, e-mail systems in corporate, institutional, and commercial environments are all potential targets of monitoring, surveillance and ultimately, censorship.
For many years, there has been an ongoing fight between employers and employees pertaining to employee rights. The main thing that they have fought about is computer and email monitoring.
In recent times our right to privacy has been under fire, particularly in the workplace. With the fear of terrorists in today's world, we have been willing to sacrifice some of our individual rights for the rights of a society as a whole. A majority of these changes have taken place since September 11, 2001, in an attempt to prevent future terrorist attacks. New legislation, such as the USA Patriot Act, which decreases the limitations on the federal government's ability to monitor people, has been created for this reason. Although new legislation may be instrumental in the defense of our national security, we must take a strong look at their effect and the effect of decreased privacy in the workplace. Advances in technology, coupled with new legislation, has had a serious toll on our privacy especially at work. It is now possible to monitor an employee's keystrokes on the computer to how much time a day is spent on bathroom breaks. It is imperative for us to take a stand against these violations to our rights
Technology has developed in leaps and bounds over the past few decades. The case is that the law always has difficulty keeping pace with new issues and technology and the few laws that are enacted are usually very general and obsucre. The main topic of this paper is to address the effect of technology on privacy in the workplace. We have to have an understanding of privacy before trying to protect it. Based on the Gift of Fire, privacy has three pieces: freedom from intrusion, control of information about one's self, and freedom from surveillance.1 People's rights has always been protected by the constitution such as the Fourth Amendment, which protects people from "unreasonable searches and seizures". As said by Eric Hughes, "Privacy is the power to selectively reveal oneself to the world."2 As written by Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis in 1928 is the right most valued by the American people was "the right to be left alone."3
In an age where instant access to information has influenced the privacy workplace model, which once prevails over what were inalienable assumptions of privacy is no longer a certainty in the workplace. Some companies require employees to sign confidentiality agreement to protect their patents, formulas, and processes. There are instances where companies dictate a “no compete” clause in their hiring practices, to prevent an employee from working for competitors for typically two years without legal implications. While these examples represent extents, employers go to protect their company’s privacy; companies do not go to that extent to protect the privacy of their employees.
Sometimes there is no middle ground. Monitoring of employees at the workplace, either you side with the employees or you believe management owns the network and should call the shots. The purpose of this paper is to tackle whether monitoring an employee is an invasion of privacy. How new technology has made monitoring of employees by employers possible. The unfairness of computerized monitoring software used to watch employees. The employers desire to ensure that the times they are paying for to be spent in their service is indeed being spent that way. Why not to monitor employees, as well as tips on balancing privacy rights of employees at the job.
Reasonable expectation of privacy justified that the employee privacy was violated “if” the employer did not inform the employee that e-mails or text message sent from the employee personal account would be saved to a hard drive by a third party. As a result, the evidence confiscated cannot be used against her in a court of law under the exclusionary
Today, society is affected by the many advances in technology. These advances affect almost every person in the world. One of the prevalent advances in technology was the invention and mass use of the Internet. Today more than ever, people around the world use the Internet to support their personal and business tasks on a daily basis. The Internet is a portal into vast amounts of information concerning almost every aspect of life including education, business, politics, entertainment, social networking, and world security. (idebate.com) Although the Internet has become a key resource in developing the world, the mass use of Internet has highlighted a major problem, privacy and the protection of individual, corporate, and even government security . The argument over whether or not the Internet should be controlled by the government has developed into a controversial issue in almost every country in the world.
But, these laws always changing, depending on the work setting or policies set by any specific organizations. Because there are so many different work environments, each claim of privacy has to be evaluated based on the actual conditions of the workplace (Smith & Burg, 2015). This is why policies must be set according to the CEO needs. If the organization does not allow the use of the internet for any personal use, than the employee must follow such guidelines. This eliminates employee privacy right violations, because the policy will informs them of the monitoring during the hiring
In Australia, Employers should implement best practice on how to maintain privacy in the workplace in accordance with the privacy standards set out in the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) (Welcome to the Fair Work Ombudsman website. n.d.). Privacy is able to keep our own personal information private and also able to do things without any electronic monitoring in the workplace. Nowadays, many company increased the usage of technology such as internet and email in the workplace. This can create issues in privacy. When employees’ access to web browsing activities during working hours, the employer can be scrutinized it. Employers take this action due to fear lawsuit if employees act in inappropriate ways. Therefore, the best policy is to explain clearly how is appropriate to use email and internet at work and outline what type of use is prohibited in the workplace. Besides that, employer also needs to ensure the employee didn’t disclose or disseminate any important information to the competitors or
This section of the report will investigate the threats that unrestricted email use would have on organisations. An article according to Rothman and Taffae (2003, p.56) states, by some estimates close to 7.2 billion emails are sent everyday. With this instant approval of the usage of emails as a method of mass communication, it has evoked a substantial risk of legal responsibility for companies.
The advent of the internet has changed the way in which technology was being used to support businesses as well as personal needs of users worldwide. Little did people realize that the internet would establish itself as a powerful facilitator of the needs of the common man in such a short period of time. However the same facilities that the Internet offers can also be a potential source for dissemination of our private information without us even knowing about it.