Data Protection, Storing rival company data, Illegal Downloads, Email Access, Fraud..

hostileworkplace

Hi,

I need some help on following specific questions please:

(1) If an employer employs someone who has stolen data from another company knowingly, who is liable for this, the employee who stole the data and/or the company that stores the data on its server?

If it is the employer, can they be sued? If so, how much?

Would it be illegal if someone were to inform the company that the ex-employee stole the data from and was/is held in the new company server despite advising otherwise?

(2) Is it legal for an employer to allow its employee to download illegal movies? When pointed out to them, they simply ignore it as the downloader is very close to the management and promote him to become another bully to say the least.

(3) If a manager has been fired for defrauding the company and he is NOT prosecuted for whatever reason, is the company legally required to disclose this to potential investors?

(4) Is it legal to access employee’s mailbox for the sake of monitoring it?

(5) Is it legal to delete emails from an employee’s mailbox without their knowledge?

(6) Can an employer legally use online conversion tools for client data that has private information i.e. convert a doc to pdf, vice versa?

(7) Can an employer sue you if you publish your experience\treatment that you have received without mentioning the company name or naming people i.e. instead of Mr Smith, you mention Financial Director? Also, email conversation, screenshots of msn conservation by removing any traces to the employer or employee of the company?

(8) If you disclose this information or bring it to the public domain can the company sue you? The reason for this, I feel I have been victimized for raising these issues while I was working with the company although I do have moral obligation as well.

Would appreciate if anyone could answer them.
Thank you,

patman99

First off, remove your initials from the end of your post.

Secondly, just have a read through of your post. How much sense does it make ?. It looks like it was done in a moment of rage.

Basically, are you asking the following -

1) If an employee of company 'A' steals data from company 'B' and stores it on a server belonging to company 'A', who is liable ?.

In this instance, if the employee is doing it during working hours and with the full knowledge and backing of the company, then they are both liable under various Acts concerning data protection and computer misuse.
If the employer has no knowledge of this activity, then only the employee can be held liable (for instance, I can store loads of 'home work' on my folder on my employers shared drive, they have access and can review anything they consider illegal and use it o dismiss me).

Would it be illegal to inform the employee's former employers ?.

Of course not. You can inform them that their former employee has a load of their data stored on the new employers server and can even do a screen-grab to illustrate what is stored and where.
We are talking about theft here. Just make sure to do the screen-garb to a pen-drive then email it from home.

Is it legal for an employer to allow its employee to download illegal movies? When pointed out to them, they simply ignore it as the downloader is very close to the management and promote him to become another bully to say the least.

Of course it is not legal. Report the company and the individual to the 'Federation Against Copyright Theft' (google 'fact+piracy'). Either one could, if prosecuted, receive a £10k fine and/or 10 years in jail.

If a manager has been fired for defrauding the company and he is NOT prosecuted for whatever reason, is the company legally required to disclose this to potential investors?

In a word, 'no'. The matter has been dealt-with. He has been fired.

Is it legal to access employee’s mailbox for the sake of monitoring it?
And is it legal to delete emails from an employee’s mailbox without their knowledge?

If the company believes an individual is engaging in illegal activities, then yes, they can monitor your mailbox. Can they delete messages without your knowledge ?. If they had, how would you know?. Could it be that the company has an auto-archive set-up to move any messages over a certain age from your inbox and place them elsewhere ?. This happens where I work.

Can an employer legally use online conversion tools for client data that has private information i.e. convert a doc to pdf, vice versa?

If there is no way to do this using the tools provided and the company agrees it is an agreeable solution to a problem that crops-up on a rare occasion, then the employee is doing nothing illegal. The online converter tools don't keep a copy of the data, they simply change the format and send it back, deleting the temporary copy they had in the process.

As for points 7 & 8, if your post contains libelous statements and here-say, they could sue you. If you stick to the facts and don't mention any names and post only from home (or follow the guide on HubPages about surfing the net anonymously), then they would not know who was posting about them.
If you are concerned about being sued, make sure you have all the evidence to back up your claims.

TonyMMM

hostileworkplace wrote: »

Hi,

I need some help on following specific questions please:

(1) If an employer employs someone who has stolen data from another company knowingly, who is liable for this, the employee who stole the data and/or the company that stores the data on its server?

If it is the employer, can they be sued? If so, how much?

Depends to some extent what the data is, how commercially sensitive it is etc. ... the other company, if made aware, could choose to take court action. If it is personal data that the company is not entitled or registered to hold, the Information commissioers office can be informed and they may/may not choose to take any action.


Would it be illegal if someone were to inform the company that the ex-employee stole the data from and was/is held in the new company server despite advising otherwise?

Not illegal, but might be a breach of your terms of employment ..

(2) Is it legal for an employer to allow its employee to download illegal movies? When pointed out to them, they simply ignore it as the downloader is very close to the management and promote him to become another bully to say the least.

Downloading copyright material is an offence, but it would be for the copyright holder to take action - if the company let it happen they may be open to the same action from the copyright holder.

(3) If a manager has been fired for defrauding the company and he is NOT prosecuted for whatever reason, is the company legally required to disclose this to potential investors?

Morally maybe, but not legally - "potential" investors need to do their own due dilligence before choosing to invest. If the company were asked the specific question and lied, that may be different.

(4) Is it legal to access employee’s mailbox for the sake of monitoring it?

Use of company IT systems will be governed by the terms of employment and/or the company IT policy - if it says they can monitor emails, then Yes.

(5) Is it legal to delete emails from an employee’s mailbox without their knowledge?

Same as Q4

(6) Can an employer legally use online conversion tools for client data that has private information i.e. convert a doc to pdf, vice versa?

Don't see why not ... but could technically be a breach of the DPA (for the Information Commissioner to take action) if client data was passed on without authorisation.

(7) Can an employer sue you if you publish your experience\treatment that you have received without mentioning the company name or naming people i.e. instead of Mr Smith, you mention Financial Director? Also, email conversation, screenshots of msn conservation by removing any traces to the employer or employee of the company?

Can they sue ...of course they can. The question is would they win ? - which would depend on whether they could show that company and/or individuals could be identified, and whether you could prove any allegations made to be true.

(8) If you disclose this information or bring it to the public domain can the company sue you? The reason for this, I feel I have been victimized for raising these issues while I was working with the company although I do have moral obligation as well.

Basically the same answer as Q7 ... you may want to read up on the area of "whistleblowing" and take proper advice from an employment law specialist.

Most companies would probably just sack you , and then let you try and take them to a tribunal.


Would appreciate if anyone could answer them.
Thank you,
BK

See above...

patman99

Op, Does your employer have a set of procedures for various tasks such as 'Conversion of data formats' ?.

Before you take whatever action you intend, have a good nose at any such procedures. You may find that they provide the answers to your questions.

Btw, it is worth contacting FACT about the illegal movie downloads. After all, the guy may be burning them to disc and selling them. I think you can still get a reward for your troubles.

As TonyMMM said in his post, you may get the sack. It depends how you go about dealing with the situation. Basically, speak to no-one and use the 'Anonymous surfing' info to leave no trail.

hostileworkplace

Thank you patman99, TonyMMM, your comments is much appreciated. Yes, I am in raged and trying to contain myself…. :-(


Guys, I am gathering facts now but will give you full story. This is a complicated case. I will create a website and detail them as these things won’t make sense now. (Of course, remove company info, etc.), so please bear with me.

Let me clarify few things.

I am only mentioning things that I have evidence of (screenshot, recordings, email, etc.). I am also mentioning things that I am made them aware of and as result why they don’t like me.

Email deletion - well they would ask to go to individual mailbox and delete them. Often I would get them to send me email to confirm which they have problem with, so they would go to the illegal downloader or someone else.

As for employer procedures, let’s not even get into this, lol. They have removed them now when I started to show how they are not in compliant when they brought a disciplinary action against me. They simply ganged up on me but at the same time left evidences of their wrong doings for public entertainments. The management really showed their true colour. For example, they disregarded a witness statement that shows that the illegal downloader (promoted to be a team leader) was intimidating me!

I am not worried about getting sacked as I am fed of working for a company that has made my life a misery. In any case, they started a redundancy process which effectively means to get rid of the two people who would question them. One of my colleagues already did a runner after signing a compromise agreement.

As for illegal download, I have raised the illegal download issue with the ex-manager and he wasn’t bothered at all as he was involved, lol. Look, it was such an issue that we would be working and the illegal downloader would just there playing around really, downloading illegal movies, etc. But he is also very close to FD. The Manager was eventually fired due to defrauding the company when someone grassed him when He made her redundant. New manager came in and a really a bully. However, he showed favouritism towards the illegal downloader. The downloader eventually was promoted to become a Team Leader (long story). We never seen to eye to eye, he resorted to bullying along with the manager, and then eventually managed to start a disciplinary proceeding against me. During this time, I have raised few issues and company was simply not interested. But resorted to further bullying...eventually devised a redundancy (see my other post) that is effectively designed to get me out of the company. Even on the consultation meeting, I asked: Is illegal download a disciplinary process? HR advisor: It is not for me to say!

TonyMMM

you seem obsessed with the illegal downloading - that is not your problem, or anything you can do something about.

QuackQuack_2

hostileworkplace wrote: »

Hi,

I need some help on following specific questions please:

(1) If an employer employs someone who has stolen data from another company knowingly, who is liable for this, the employee who stole the data and/or the company that stores the data on its server?

IANAL but before I considered the issue of the new company using the 'stolen' data, I'd want to investigate the 'old' company and their practice for securely storing the data in the first place - I'd probably want to prosecute them if this was a serious breach TBH.

As for the impact of this in terms of stealing customers and wotnot, well you can try and enforce a confidentiality clause (if you had one), or just accept you need to be more careful with your data because quite apart from any prosecution or loss of business, it usually tends to damage trust and reputation with customers who won't come back.

I guess I may be old fashioned and have a twisted view, but if staff can steal significant amounts of data in the first place, you have some serious flaws in your systems and security and you deserve to be prosecuted for it at the very least, and certainly don't deserve the trust or business of the customers whos data has been lifted.

Emmzi

Boy, you have a giant axe to grind don't you?

So the question is, do you want to be a poor martyr, or a comfortably off quiet person?

Redundant, or compromise agreement, I suspect the choice is yours!

hostileworkplace

Thanks guys, QuackQuack, it's NOT one off thing and you can't blame the old company at all as the employee used desperate means, lol. See if you can guess. Data from CRM system.

When he joined, I had a heated argument with the manager about legality and morality of the issue. He simply ignored me and gave him a laptop to facilitiate this - wanted to impress, you see. Must have told FD who I am sure knew. Then during review and reorganization of server data, I was astonished to see it on the server and had a chat with the manager again. He simply told me to shut up or else.... Despite this, I decided to delete the data and it was moved so that I don't delete or move it. It's documented on email.

Emmzi - I am more than happy for them to make me redundant and take things accordingly. This company is full of cowboys and there are more than what I have told you so far. Headlines materials, you see.

Emmzi

Ok OP - just remember there's a lot of unemployed martyrs in the world. Good luck to you.

WhiteHorse

In these situations, it is usually best to say nothing. Then slide the knife in from behind. Being the big crusader very rarely has a good outcome.