You've Got Mail, And Your Boss Is Reading It

from the how-nice dept

It turns out that the vast majority of companies no longer trust their employees with their own email accounts. 92% of companies now say that they check up on how their employees use email - though nearly half of all companies don't bother mentioning this fact to their employees. They mostly say it's okay for people to do some amount of personal stuff via email, as long as it's reasonable, but most don't bother to define "reasonable" to their employees. Many companies also don't have any system in place to make sure that whoever is monitoring email doesn't abuse the system. Just another reminder that it probably makes sense to have a personal email account for personal business.
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  • identicon
    Joe Schmoe, 8 Oct 2003 @ 8:55am

    Momma always said...

    Stupid is as stupid does...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    westpac, 8 Oct 2003 @ 9:43am

    not everybody

    To monitor the email of a DoD employee or contractor requires a search warrant from either civilian authorities or the provost marshal. If my boss ordered me to open another employee's email without doing this I would be fired. While email (and telephones) are subject to monitoring it cannot be done indiscriminantly and at the lower management level.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Director Mitch, 8 Oct 2003 @ 10:40am

      And It Could be Public One Day

      This sort of goes with your Enron email article yesterday where emails weren't read by bosses, but by EVERYONE after being posted by the government.

      While they can still be monitored, but with more difficulty, I always do personal email over a web email service and leave the official pop servier for business.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 9 Oct 2003 @ 7:42am

      Re: not everybody

      You're a moron... and you're not even close.

      Your communications section reads your e-mail all the time. Where I'm at, the communications sections actually sends e-mails *as* individual users! I had a user grab me in the hall today and ask why they had recieved a return recipet for an e-mail message they didn't send from themselves to theirself that didn't appear in their sent items.

      Now, I won't even go into some of the details about pilots who have been called before his boss because their free-lance war stories to the editors of certain magazines got caught in the surveillence net.

      privacy legislation, HIPAA, lawyer-client privlidge, all of it is null and void in the name of National Security(tm). Because you don't know this, I can tell you work on the other side of the fence... silly rabbit.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 9 Oct 2003 @ 9:24am

      Re: not everybody

      Sorry westpac, you don't know what your talking about. Your email is scanned and recorded. If you don't think so, you're fooling yourself.

      I agree there is a lot of pressure to prevent
      peons spying on each other, but at high levels
      none of that applies - bosses see anything they
      want to see. No warrent needed. Don't you remember all the forms you signed when you got your account - basically informing you that you have NO expectations of privacy.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        westpac, 9 Oct 2003 @ 11:05am

        Re: not everybody

        to the person who called me a moron and the person who says I don't know what I'm talking about: read my fucking post and then shut the fuck up. I said YOUR BOSS cannot read your email. Being scanned is a totally different manner. I have worked in computer security for DoD for a dozen years and know EXACTLY what the fuck I'm talking about. I have seen two program-level managers lose their jobs for going on another employee's PC to read their email.

        To clarify: your email and phone may be monitored by security. Your boss cannot do so. So fuck both of you.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Beck, 8 Oct 2003 @ 12:48pm

    Cat's Out of the Bag

    If they are monitoring web surfing too they now know that I know they are reading my mail.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 9 Oct 2003 @ 8:26am

    Revenge is Bitter Tasting

    Thats alright 'cause I pee in their watercooler

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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