FBI probes co-worker e-mail snooping
June 5, 2008 by Fred HosierPosted in: Employees do the strangest things, Special Report
Once upon a time, snooping on co-workers consisted of listening in on conversations, in person or on the phone, or intercepting written documents. Now, in the Internet age, you can add opening others’ e-mail messages to the list.
A Philadelphia TV station has suspended its top anchor indefinitely pending an investigation into whether he opened hundreds of e-mails of a former co-anchor.
KYW-TV anchor Larry Mendte allegedly opened former colleague Alycia Lane’s private e-mail over many months, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.
Mendte’s potential troubles don’t end at work. The FBI is investigating whether he spread gossip about Lane to the media.
Lane isn’t a stranger to controversy. She was fired earlier this year after an altercation with a New York City police officer. She faced charges, but under an agreement, they are expected to be dismissed later this year.
Before that, Lane made the gossip pages in an incident involving cable sports anchor Rich Eisen. Eisen’s wife chastised her in a scathing e-mail for sending Eisen photos of Lane wearing a bikini.
No one knows how New York newspapers got a copy of that e-mail.
Is this much ado about nothing – just a media spat between celebrities? Hardly.
Serious business
Intercepting e-mail is a crime under the federal Wiretap Act. It’s no different than illegally tapping someone’s phone.
And a federal court has interpreted broadly what constitutes an e-mail intercept. Some had tried to define intercept as “in transit.” But the First Circuit court said the Wiretap Act does prohibit viewing e-mails that are in temporary storage before they are delivered.
A former prosecutor quoted by The Inquirer speculates that the feds are pursuing the Mendte case because he could be held up as an example.
Punishment would be determined by the economic loss to the injured party.
In this case, Lane’s attorneys may argue that Mendte was trying to damage her career or affect the outcome of her lawsuit against the station after it fired her.
There’s no word yet on the potential legal exposure for the TV station.
Does your company have a policy on employee snooping? Does it cover electronic communication? Let us know about it.
June 6th, 2008 at 10:45 am
In the realm of e-mail: when an email is sent directly from one person to another, what is the legality of the receiver forwarding on the original email to someone else (with or without comments) without the knowledge or consent of the originator? What is the legal psotion of ‘Blind Coping’ on an email?
June 6th, 2008 at 11:11 am
What about reading personal information of employees for security reasons? Nothing is passed on but for security or legal reasons we would need to hold onto the information.
There has been a case here where someone was suspected of doing damage to files. They were frustrated about their position (which nothing was said) and found the need to write personal emails critisizing superiors and talking about leaving the company. We were able to catch what was happening before they were able to be sucessful in an attempt if they tried.
June 6th, 2008 at 11:40 am
I believe that private e-mail is exactly that. However, company provided e-mail accounts and computers are the property of the employer and misuse of the e-mail account or computer could expose the employer to possible liabilities under state and federal law. Is it permissable to censure company e-mails and computers with authorization from the employee provided that the employee is made aware of this practice in advance and 2 supervisors withn the HR department are present during such censure?
June 6th, 2008 at 11:43 am
This article is about personal emails, right? does that mean they were using a work computer to check personal emails? Would that make it the responsibility of the person to log off or maybe not check email at work?
June 6th, 2008 at 11:45 am
We have a policy stating that there is no privacy regarding the use of all company business equipment and all passwords must be provided to our Information Systems Deparment and we reserve the right to monitor all business equipment, and its contents may be disclosed at the companies sole discretion to third parties without further notice to employee. Managers have proxy to their teams email not to snoop but in order to conduct business. HR has proxy to all emails. Our employees are all familiar with this policy, we go over it at the time of hiring, each year at review time and emails are sent out during the year to remind them.
June 6th, 2008 at 11:58 am
From the editor: To answer Oze’s question, yes, we’re talking about personal e-mail.
However, a news anchor may have reason to check personal e-mail at work. For example: The anchor gives his/her personal e-mail address to news sources and therefore has to check it at work.
Many companies do prohibit or even block the ability to check personal e-mail at work. But reporters in the media would probably have a valid argument to be able to access their personal accounts on their work computer.
June 16th, 2008 at 11:08 am
I love Larry Mendte. CBS3′s not the same.
June 26th, 2008 at 6:02 am
[...] wrote earlier about the saga of news anchorsat the CBS-TV affiliate in Philadelphia. One anchor, Alycia Lane, was let go because, according to [...]
November 26th, 2008 at 6:03 am
[...] in June, HRB told you about a Philadelphia TV news anchor who was suspended by the station and under investigation by the FBI for hacking into the private e-mail of his former [...]