ACT Employment Terminated After Employer Accessed My Facebook - Employee Rights?

[terry walters]

This afternoon, I received a phone call form my boss saying I have been stood down from my position after they went into my private Facebook account. Are employers allowed to hack into accounts and read private conversations? If not, what employment law or privacy law is there to stop them?

 

[Sophea]

Hi Terry,

How did they view your Facebook account? Did they merely look at what is visible to other users on your profile? (If this were the case, they have done nothing wrong and have not breached any law) Were you logged in on your work computer already, and they looked at it on your work computer? Or did they actually hack in and bypass your password security from a different computer?

If they happened to walk by your work computer and you were logged into your face book account on your work computer, there was likely no offence committed. As the computer is the company's property and they have the right to monitor how you use it. For example, if you have a work phone, everything you store on that phone would be the property of your employer and they can request it back at any time.

If as your comments above suggest, they actually bypassed security and hacked in to your facebook account by figuring out your password, they committed an illegal act. It is illegal to intentionally access password protected information of another person without their permission. This includes logging into someone else's email or social networking site.

 

[terry walters]

This afternoon, I received a phone call form my boss saying I have been stood down from my position after they went into my private Facebook account. Are employers allowed to hack into accounts and read private conversations? If not, what employment law or privacy law is there to stop them?

No I do not access my face book at work they accessed my profile remotely and gained access to my private messages without my knowledge

 

[terry walters]

This afternoon, I received a phone call form my boss saying I have been stood down from my position after they went into my private Facebook account. Are employers allowed to hack into accounts and read private conversations? If not, what employment law or privacy law is there to stop them?

is there an act or section of law that this is stated in ?

 

[Rod]

Check this out:

Division 477-478 of the Criminal Code Act includes serious computer offences, such as hacking, that can be prosecuted at the federal level. Division 477.1 of the Criminal Code Act:

"(1) A person is guilty of an offence if:
(a) the person causes:
(i) any unauthorised access to data held in a computer; or
(ii) any unauthorised modification of data held in a computer; or
(iii) any unauthorised impairment of electronic communication to or from a computer; and
(b) the unauthorised access, modification or impairment is caused by means of a carriage service; and
(c) the person knows the access, modification or impairment is unauthorised; and
(d) the person intends to commit, or facilitate the commission of, a serious offence against a law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory (whether by that person or another person) by the access, modification or impairment."​

Also - Cybercrime Act 2001. They are criminal offences not civil, and would be prosecuted by the police. You need to work out what you want out this situation. Have you been sacked or stood down with pay or without pay?

 

[terry walters]

Check this out:

Division 477-478 of the Criminal Code Act includes serious computer offences, such as hacking, that can be prosecuted at the federal level. Division 477.1 of the Criminal Code Act:

"(1) A person is guilty of an offence if:
(a) the person causes:
(i) any unauthorised access to data held in a computer; or
(ii) any unauthorised modification of data held in a computer; or
(iii) any unauthorised impairment of electronic communication to or from a computer; and
(b) the unauthorised access, modification or impairment is caused by means of a carriage service; and
(c) the person knows the access, modification or impairment is unauthorised; and
(d) the person intends to commit, or facilitate the commission of, a serious offence against a law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory (whether by that person or another person) by the access, modification or impairment."​

Also - Cybercrime Act 2001. They are criminal offences not civil, and would be prosecuted by the police. You need to work out what you want out this situation. Have you been sacked or stood down with pay or without pay?

Thank you Rob no I haven't been sacked yet I Have been stood down have to face the boss and HR at work tomorrow

 

[terry walters]

Check this out:

Division 477-478 of the Criminal Code Act includes serious computer offences, such as hacking, that can be prosecuted at the federal level. Division 477.1 of the Criminal Code Act:

"(1) A person is guilty of an offence if:
(a) the person causes:
(i) any unauthorised access to data held in a computer; or
(ii) any unauthorised modification of data held in a computer; or
(iii) any unauthorised impairment of electronic communication to or from a computer; and
(b) the unauthorised access, modification or impairment is caused by means of a carriage service; and
(c) the person knows the access, modification or impairment is unauthorised; and
(d) the person intends to commit, or facilitate the commission of, a serious offence against a law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory (whether by that person or another person) by the access, modification or impairment."​

Also - Cybercrime Act 2001. They are criminal offences not civil, and would be prosecuted by the police. You need to work out what you want out this situation. Have you been sacked or stood down with pay or without pay?

Stood down with pay the thing that gets me is this as I was asked I removed the private message only to find that someone had got back into my account and put the message back up

 

[terry walters]

Thank you Rob your a life saver

 

[Ian Macleod]

We wrote about this subject late last year and there is some case law you might benefit from reading

A recent case in the Fair Work Commission highlights a lawful termination of an employee following the employee’s misuse of social media.

Cameron Little v Credit Corp Group Limited t/as Credit Corp Group (U2013/11522), was initiated by Cameron Little following termination of his employment after his employer became aware of inappropriate comments he made on Facebook outside of his work hours. The FWC concluded that the dismissal was lawful.

There have been other cases concerning the dismissal of employees for inappropriate social media use that did not stack up to scrutiny. What makes this one different? http://bit.ly/1uHf6rs

 

[John R]

Interesting case @Ian Macleod!
The decision is also available on the Federal Work Commission's website as Cameron Little v Credit Corp Group Limited t/as Credit Corp Group [2013] FWC 9642.