It’s illegal for employers to snoop into your private phone, court rules

It is illegal for employers to snoop into their employees’ private phones during investigations over alleged misconduct, a court has ruled.

Justice Monica Mbaru of the Employment and Labour Relations Court on Tuesday found that the audit firm KPMG violated Ms Gloria Jepkurui Koima’s right to privacy when they seized her personal phone without her consent and used the information they retrieved from it to back up disciplinary proceedings against her.

The court directed that the information sourced from the phone be expunged from the record.

WORKPLACE POLICIES

She said the hearing shall only relate to her work phone and work laptop and other evidence that KPMG has of her by the use of its workplace policies and code of conduct.

“All information obtained from Ms Jepkurui’s personal phone shall be returned in soft or hard copies and shall not form part of her work records unless she wishes to use the same in her case voluntarily,” ruled Justice Mbaru.

The judge said the use of any personal data, information and communication must be with the unequivocal consent of the person.

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