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European Court rules bosses can monitor employees' private messages on WhatsApp and other messaging services

14 January 2016

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"Companies have the right to monitor their workers’ online private messages, a court has ruled.

The European Court of Human Rights made the ruling on a case involving a Romanian engineer who was fired after using Yahoo Messenger not only to communicate with professional contacts, but also to send messages to his fiancée and brother."

See the article: European Court rules bosses can monitor employees' private messages on WhatsApp and other messaging services (Independent, link)

Recommended deading: Is Workplace Privacy Dead? Comments on the Barbulescu judgment (EU Law Analysis, link): "When can an employer read an employee’s e-mails or texts, or track her use of the Internet? It’s an important question for both employers and employees. A judgment this week in Barbulescu v Romania addressed the issue, but unfortunately has been greeted by press headlines such as ‘EU court allows employers to read all employee e-mails’. This is wrong on two counts: it’s not a judgment of an EU court, but of the separate European Court of Human Rights; and the ruling does not allow employers to read all employee e-mails without limitation."

ECHR: Press release (pdf) and Judgment: CASE OF BÃRBULESCU v. ROMANIA (Application no. 61496/08) (pdf)

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