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Feds: Your Employer Can't Stop You From Recording Conversations At Work (huffingtonpost.com)
schwit1 writes with news about a ruling by the National Labor Relations Board about your right to record conversations at work. The Huffington Post reports: "If you're looking to catch your boss breaking labor law, that smartphone in your pocket might be your best friend, thanks to a new ruling from federal officials. On Thursday, the National Labor Relations Board ruled that upscale grocer Whole Foods cannot forbid employees from recording conversations or taking photographs at work without a supervisor's permission. (Local laws, however, could still come into play in certain situations, as several states require the consent of two parties in order for a conversation to be recorded legally.) At the center of the case were stipulations in Whole Foods' 'General Information Guide,' an employee manual laying out worker do's and don'ts. The guide prohibited workers from taking photos or recording conversations inside a store 'unless prior approval is received' from a manager or executive, or 'unless all parties to the conversation give their consent.'"
They can't "blanket" stop all circumstances where someone would be filming, that doesn't make all filming at work legitimate or legal though.
And yet the neither the summary nor the title said or implied any such thing. The summary even explicitly says in the fourth sentence:
(Local laws, however, could still come into play in certain situations, as several states require the consent of two parties in order for a conversation to be recorded legally.)
This one line from the summary shouldn't be ignored: "(Local laws, however, could still come into play in certain situations, as several states require the consent of two parties in order for a conversation to be recorded legally.)"
Here's a map of 'eavesdropping' (recording) laws by state:
http://www.vegress.com/can-i-r...
Washington, California, Nevada, Montana, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, and Florida all seem to require two-party notification before recording conversations, otherwise it's deemed as 'eavesdropping' and illegal.
The very headline implies just such a thing. The specific thing at issue in this case was the WF handbook banned recording of 'Team Meetings'. The NLRB found that PARTICULAR thing illegal, because 'team meetings' could include union organizing activities, and by law, the company can not interfere with those. This ruling in NO WAY bans ALL company prohibitions on recording, only ones that interfere with origanization activities. And that has nothing to do with any local laws.
Do you have a reading comprehension problem? The headline is WRONG. The ruling does NOT say your employer can not prohibit you from recording. The ruling says your employer can't issue a recording ban in such a way that would interfere with things protected by section 7 of the NLRA (unionization). It does NOT say they can't prevent you from recording ANYTHING ELSE.
I'm not seeing the issue. The summary only says that your employer can't stop you. It doesn't say or imply that state law can't stop you.
And that is wrong, but in this case I'll give them a pass since the rest of the media also seems to be reading this ruling entirely wrong.
Here's the KEY phrase which nobody is paying attention to, from the actual ruling:
if employees are acting in concert for their mutual aid and protection and no overriding employer interest is present.
What the ruling was about was situations where the employees were recording potential misdeeds or illegal activity (related to unions, etc.) There are MANY situations where the employer has an obvious interest, such as protecting trade secrets or customer information.
And more to the point, it only addresses rules which prohibit actual recording. It does not at all address rules which say things like "no cell phones or cameras are allowed on the property".