In Australia, Bosses May Get Power To Snoop On Emails

Numerous readers noted the proposal by the Australian government for legislation to allow employers to snoop on employees' email and IM conversations. This is being proposed in the name of protecting the infrastructure from terrorism. The attorney-general cited the Estonian cyber-attacks as a reason why such employer monitoring is necessary in Australia — never mind that the attacks were perpetrated by a lone 20-year-old and not by a foreign government or terrorist. The law permitting intelligence agencies to snoop on citizens without permission expires this June, leading to the government's urgency to extend and expand it. The chairman of Electronic Frontiers Australia said, "These new powers will facilitate fishing expeditions into employees' emails and computer use rather than being used to protect critical infrastructure. I'm talking about corporate eavesdropping and witch-hunts... If an employer wanted to [sack] someone, they could use these powers."

Comments

Re:In Kiwi New Zealand

[SHaFT7]

can't you already do this in the states?

Re:In Kiwi New Zealand

[speedingant]

Also in NZ. It makes complete sense! They have every right to see what is going on inside their own company, and what activity is going on inside their network.

Re:really?

[JustShootMe]

No, which is why you shouldn't send sensitive personal emails over a corporate network.

Thanks for being condescending.

Re:really?

[wvmarle]

As an employer actually I consider it a right to know what my employees are doing. When using company resources (telephone, e-mail, Internet, whatever) then of course an employee has a right to use it for personal matters, but that should be limited to the necessary.
For example, if they have to call their bank, then it always always must be done during office hours. But calling their lover that can be done after office hours.
For e-mail: most people these days have an e-mail address already. Personal things they should send using that e-mail address. Work things are for the company provided address.
It would be scary for me to not be allowed to check on my employees, to see that they are doing what they are paid for. Scary to be never allowed to read their e-mails, when I deem necessary (hasn't happened yet but it's possible) - the most likely situation for me would occur when a customer says "I sent that to this employee", who happens to be on vacation then, upon which I'd start looking through their company mail box.
An employee should know that this is company resource, and the company also should have a right to check/limit the usage.

It's a beatup about a non-story.

[Jacques Chester]

First I rang my local member, who referred me to Julia Gillard's office (she made the original idiotic statements). Her office referred me to the Attorney-General's office, as that's where it's coming from.

The nice functionary I spoke to there said it's a media beatup. Under Australian law it's illegal to intercept the communications of a third party without a warrant. There was some wondering about whether passing emails through a virus scan qualified as warrantless interception.

Rather than going through some court case about to settle the matter, it was felt that it would be easier just to amend the Telecommunications Interception Act instead.

So that's it. There's actually no story here at all. Though it did provoke me to write an angry rant before I started doing what the journalists should have done in the first place - check the facts.