Carving out an e-mail privacy policy

Now is the time to define a privacy policy for employees' e-mail, if you haven't already. To be effective, this policy must be published and enterprises must ensure that employees are aware of it. If employees are not aware of the policy, there may be legal repercussions should their unfounded expectations (reasonable or otherwise) be violated.

But what should be included in your privacy policy? Industry practice seems to say that the employee mailbox is like the desk drawer: private. Other employees - even supervisors - should not go snooping through their colleagues' e-mail without specific authorization obtained through a defined business process.

However, there are cases where the company needs to "drill the lock" on the desk drawer (or the mailbox) in order to obtain its contents. These cases come up when the employee is suspected of wrongdoing or when the mailbox is thought to contain information that is urgently needed by an absent employee's colleagues.

Also, e-mail may be monitored during network administration and troubleshooting. Unless one mandates enterprisewide encryption of all e-mail, there's no way to guarantee that network administrator eyeballs won't linger for a moment on messages decoded by the local "Sniffer."

Rapport Communication has recently merged with The Burton Group. The Burton Group is a leading information technology advisory and consulting firm. It provides in-depth analysis of emerging network computing technologies such as directory services, next generation messaging, secure messaging, NOS migration, public key infrastructure, and networking infrastructure. As part of its Network Strategy Service for network planners, The Burton Group offers the Catalyst Conference once a year in late July.

E-mail: The litigation time bomb. Your E-mail can become evidence, so craft a usage policy that you can stand behind. Network World, 4/7/97.

Where is Messaging Technology Headed in the Next Century? from The Electronic Messaging Associations Messaging Magazine.

Ethical Implications of Provacy in Electronic Mail

Company Email Policy - Topics and Alternative Clauses

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