European Court Rules on the Permissibility of Accessing Employee Email

In the newly released case of Barbulescu –v- Romania, the European Court of Human Rights (the “ECHR”) has ruled that an employer in Romania did not breach the privacy rights of its employee when it monitored personal chats on a Yahoo Messenger account which he was meant to use for business purposes. 

The employee had been dismissed in 2007 after he had been informed by his employer that his communications had been monitored from 5 to 13 July 2007 and the records showed he had used the internet for personal purposes. The employee replied that he had only used the service for professional purposes but was presented with extensive