Mondaq Business Briefing -Pinsent Curtis BiddleUnited Kingdom - Scanning the Staff.

(From Mondaq.com)

With a computer on most desk tops the British workforce can now communicate and organise itself more efficiently than ever before. But networked computers also provide new ways for employees to breach the terms of their contracts of employment or break the law.

Abuse of computer resources

Businesses must develop and enforce an effective email/internet monitoring and security policy, and simple timewasting is the least of their problems. There have been cases of employees storing illegal porn on office computer systems, instances of sexual or racial harassment via e-mail and countless defamatory statements on websites or in e-mails, all of which could put the business itself on the wrong side of the law.

One of the biggest corporate crackdowns to date came this July when a British computer company sacked two employees and suspended 150 others for sending e-mails described as offensive, unauthorised and inappropriate.

Aside from the vicarious liability of an employer for the acts of its employees, computer crime is a hot topic. Earlier this year the US House of Representatives passed the "Cyber Security Enhancement Act" to give the authorities more power to detect and investigate crimes committed via computer.

Rights and obligations- fair monitoring