Nearly 80% of major US companies monitor their employees by
checking their e-mail, internet, or telephone connections or by
videotaping them at work, according to a recent survey by the
American Management Association of 1,627 large and mid-sized US
firms.
Internet use is monitored by 63% of US employers, up from 54% a
year ago, and 47% store and review employee e-mail, an increase
from 38% in 2000, the survey found. Around 40% block internet
connections to unauthorised or inappropriate sites, up from 29%
last year.
More than a quarter of surveyed companies (27%) say that they have
fired employees for misuse of office e-mail or internet
connections, and nearly two-thirds (65%) report some disciplinary
measure for those offences.
These figures show that the level of employee monitoring in the
US is significantly higher than in the UK. A recent UK survey found
that 20% of companies monitor e-mails on a monthly basis and 10%
monitor daily. Over 80% of companies said they have internet and
e-mail policies and cited the downloading of pornography as the
main reason for sackings over misuse of these systems.
In terms of UK regulations, businesses must have lawful
authority to monitor their staff for relevant and justifiable
specified business purposes provided they have made “all reasonable
efforts to inform every person” who may use their system that
e-mail or internet use may be intercepted.
OUT-LAW.COM will shortly make available a free internet and
e-mail policy which you can download and use for your business. If
you want to be contacted when the policy becomes available, e-mail
E-mail info@out-law.com.
