According to an article on BBC companies in European countries that have ratified the European Convention on Human Rights, which includes Britain, have the legal right to snoop their employees private messenger accounts at work.
This news comes after a man in Strasbourg went to court after his employers accessed his personal Yahoo messenger account on the basis that they had reason to believe that the employee in question was using his Yahoo Messenger account for both personal and professional use during office hours after the company had strictly forbidden their employees from using private messenger accounts during work hours.
The judges that handed down their decision on Tuesday said: “The employer acted within its disciplinary powers since, as the domestic courts found, it had accessed the Yahoo Messenger account on the assumption that the information in question had been related to professional activities and that such access had therefore been legitimate. The court sees no reason to question these findings.”
According to Lilian Edwards who spoke to BBC regarding the incident, in this particular case, the company was perfectly within its rights despite the employees claim to his personal life being invaded due to the fact that the employer had explicitly put a ban on such activities during working hours.
Although this is true, in today’s age where people are working longer hours, the blanket bans on personal internet usage are quite unreasonable and if companies want to place such bans on their employees, they need to put in place the appropriate employee-monitoring policies.