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Google Employee Sues For $3.8 Billion Over Confidentiality Policies (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader writes: A Google product manager has filed a lawsuit against the company for its confidentiality policies on the grounds they violate California labor laws. California labor laws give employees the right to discuss workplace issues with law enforcement, regulators, the media, and other employees. Google is accused of firing the employee for exercising his rights, then smearing his reputation in an internal email sent to the rest of the company. These policies are put in place to allegedly prevent the leaking of potentially damaging information to regulators or law enforcement. They in turn prohibit employees from speaking out about illegal activity within the company, even to its own lawyers, and encourage them to report other employees suspected of leaking information. The Verge has obtained a copy of the complaint, linked below in full. "Google's motto is 'don't be evil.' Google's illegal confidentiality agreements and policies fail this test," the lawsuit reads. One policy allegedly even prevents employees from writing a novel about working for a large Silicon Valley corporation -- like, for instance, Dave Eggers' dystopian novel, The Circle -- without first getting final draft approval from Google. The Information confirmed that this lawsuit was filed by the same individual, known in the suit only as "John Doe," who filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board earlier this year over many of the same confidentiality policies.
Maybe they did cause harm to this person. I don't know. But even so, there's no way they caused 3.8 billion dollars of harm. What is this idiot smoking?
6. You can make money without doing evil.
Can you?
They bought Keyhole from the CIA.
I don't believe their revenue stream or anything they boast about. I can't trust a company that isn't transparent. If they have something to hide then they are not on the right side of the law.
no overreach there
That's completely irrelevant to any matter of law; it's theatrics—which is what law really is all about: Theatre.
This is why society feels like shifty house of cards built atop a hill of sand. It's just people yelling nonsense at each other, and hoping that some stranger in a black trash bag (or wig, as the case may be) forms a favorable, personal opinion on the matter. What a joke.
Neither the summary nor the article give much information. My guess is that someone was fired for cause and is blaming everyone but him (or her) self.
$100 says they won't exist in 2020
thats the tip of the iceberg. If this gets overturned as illegal you will see other tech companies subjected to the same types of complaints and more importantly, a flood of potential information about the real shenanigans going on and the true level of privacy violations they commit in the course of business.
No one really wants the to illicitly gain access to these companies' metaphorical secret sauces recipies, we just want to make sure the ingredient list doesn't include rat poison.
Most large companies now have an ethics/goverance contact for exactly this reason: giving an employees an outlet to safely report shady stuff without recrimination, along with a mandatory annual ethics training video. If Google has something like this, they're probably OK and this is just a whiny employee. If not, well then, they will after this lawsuit. (Not getting sued by whistleblowers is largely a solved problem in corporate America: they report, get paid off, and life goes on after some non-public changes.)
I'm no google fan, but this is clearly just a shakedown. In cases like this, I believe the lawyer (not the plaintif) should be fined for being full of shit and trying to shake someone down, big company, small company, individual, doesn't matter.
Maybe they did cause harm to this person. I don't know. But even so, there's no way they caused 3.8 billion dollars of harm. What is this idiot smoking?
It sure is getting everyone's attention, isn't it?
And maybe the next person who is ordered to sign a bunch of BS papers regarding confidentiality and whatnot.
See, if they just filed a suit, there would have - maybe - been an out of court settlement with another document saying that he'll keep his mouth shut for ever and ever and in the meantime, Google or whoever keeps on with these policies.
In my years I have signed too many of those fucking things - and they ALWAYS spring them on you AFTER you have turned in your notice and you have very little recourse to turn back.
And you know what? 99.99999% of the time they were unnecessary because they had lame-ass "technology" and were doing the same shit that everyone else does. But it made their egos feel good that their "groundbreaking" and "innovative" ideas won't be stolen.
I predict they will settle for $1.061 Billion. The lawyers will take $1 Billion and each employee will get a $100 gift card for the Google store.
$100 says they won't exist in 2020
They don't. They're called Alphabet now. Google is just their porn finder - I mean search engine.
Considering Google apparently made 75 Billion in profits last year, 3.8 Billion hardly seems all that "yuge" when taken into perspective.
Also I'm not sure what writing novels and all the rest is about, but the last time I heard about Google and confidentiality was all about unfair wages and employees sharing information about what they make with each other to get a better idea of how much money they should be making in relation to everyone else.
Seeing as the work produced by said employees profited almost 75 Billion, the lawsuit is for 3.8 Billion, and this is probably about employee wages, it doesn't seem all that unjustified. In fact, without having a valuation that large it would probably be hard to be taken seriously by corporate at all without being ignored or simply just spending who cares how much throwing lawyers at the problem. Even at 3.8 Billion, at almost 1.5B a week, Google could pay off that amount in just over 2 weeks...
Go work somewhere else dude. If you don't like their policies, find another job. Nobody owes you employment!
What surprising to me is that somebody still believes that 'don't be evil' motto... Poor naive souls...
There's a big difference between writing a book and contacting authorities. If I get fired for contacting the police/FBI/etc about a relevant matter, it's a lot different than getting fired for writing a tell-all book with what might contain company secrets.
Just unethical. Big difference!!
One is keeping your employees from talking about the company true or not and over-managing the employees rights to free speech. This is unethical.
The other would be like slicing the throats of all employee's children who don't toe the company line. This is evil.
Are we clear? I hate it when the line gets blurred.
absolutely nothing