Big Brother is Watching: Corporate Monitoring of Employee Social Media Workplace

Abstract

An employee of a company filed a discrimination lawsuit stating various allegations. However, one significant issue arising out of this case focused on the e-mails sent by the employee using a personal password-protected yahoo account on a company owned laptop. The laptop utilized certain software, unbeknownst to the employee, saved a copy of every email sent to the employee’s lawyer. The determination of whether the company could use these emails in the lawsuit against the former employee went all the way to the New Jersey Supreme Court. This case garnered attention with media scrutiny due to the possible implications this case could have for the legal concept of attorney-client privilege and social media. The names of the parties have been changed in order to protect various individuals. This case is appropriate for graduate and undergraduate business law, business management, and human resource management classes.