4 ms·

Seriously, stop writing. If you are aggrieved, take the guy to court. That is what the legal system is there for. Blogging will inevitably only prejudice a case

by babul 18y ago

Seriously, stop writing. If you are aggrieved, take the guy to court. That is what the legal system is there for. Blogging will inevitably only prejudice a case. If the money does not matter to you, then at least do it to set precedent and discourage such behaviour. I don’t know if there is Legal Aid in the U.S. (like in the U.K.) but at least use the Small Claims Court system (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_claims_court http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_claims_court) or contact Judge Judy (or whoever is in vogue at the moment) to shame him more publically (as it seems like you are following a name-and-shame strategy).

cperciva 18y ago
If you are aggrieved, take the guy to court. If everything in the article is true, it sounds to me like a civil lawsuit is step 2. Step 1 would be reporting the computer intrusion to law enforcement authorities (hopefully there are good logs to document the fact that someone accessed his VPN) -- stealing someone's account credentials and logging in to remote systems without proper authorization isn't just a privacy violation, it's also a crime.
- 1gor 18y ago
  An employer has the right to check private email of an employee. It seems that the shafted guy is pissed off because he did not think that his employee status would give his opponent the right to snoop.
  - ivey 18y ago
    How do you figure? I don't know the specific laws involved, but I can't see any way to claim that my employer (if I had one) has the right to read my Gmail account, or to access emails hosted on my personal server.
  - catch23 18y ago
    what? I've never heard of that before. If employers had the right to check private email, do they also have to right to record calls made from your home? Do they also have the right to break into your home and search for materialTh
  - TrevorJ 18y ago
    I find that assertion to be borderline ridiculous.
  - gojomo 18y ago
    An employer has the right to check private email of an employee. It seems that the shafted guy is pissed off because he did not think that his employee status would give his opponent the right to snoop. You should qualify that: the employer has a right to view a work-provided email account, and the work-provided computer. But not all employee email. In this case, the employer's rights could hinge on whether the email accessed was sent to an @employer.com address, and whether McConnell's claimed prior agreement about a "personal partition" on the company-reimbursed laptop is substantiated.
  - 1gor 18y ago
    To answer most of the sibling comments: "U.S. Court Affirms Employer's Right to Read Employees' Email" at http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-14518/U-S-Court-Affirms-Employer.html http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-14518/U-S-Court-Affi... Keeping anything private on a corporate laptop or accessing private email through corporate network does not guarantee any privacy at all. There is a company right now arguing it has right to read Yahoo email of an employee. http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/06/company_argues.html http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/06/co... I take downmodding of my comment above as a sign of righteous indignation about US privacy laws.
    - cperciva 18y ago
      U.S. Court Affirms Employer's Right to Read Employees' Email Fraser v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company is entirely irrelevant here: That case dealt with whether a company has the right to access emails stored on the company's server. There's a question of privacy there, but not one of computer crime -- Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company did not access computer systems without the owner's permission. This is manifestly different from the situation as I read it to be here, where it was being alleged that the article's author's VPN was being accessed without his permission. The Structured Settlements case is more relevant, but it fails on two counts: First, the legal theory being put forward by Structured Settlements involves them merely observing what Mr. Palma had done on one of their computers -- their claim is that they didn't access his Yahoo account, but merely saw him accessing his Yahoo account -- and second, the Structured Settlements case has yet to be tested in a courtroom. Yes, the US has very weak privacy laws, but that doesn't extend to its computer crime laws -- and accessing a computer system without authorization is a computer crime, not just a privacy violation. And of course, IANAL, the above is not legal advice, etc.

by babul 18y ago

cperciva 18y ago

If you are aggrieved, take the guy to court. If everything in the article is true, it sounds to me like a civil lawsuit is step 2. Step 1 would be reporting the computer intrusion to law enforcement authorities (hopefully there are good logs to document the fact that someone accessed his VPN) -- stealing someone's account credentials and logging in to remote systems without proper authorization isn't just a privacy violation, it's also a crime.

1gor 18y ago
An employer has the right to check private email of an employee. It seems that the shafted guy is pissed off because he did not think that his employee status would give his opponent the right to snoop.
- ivey 18y ago
  How do you figure? I don't know the specific laws involved, but I can't see any way to claim that my employer (if I had one) has the right to read my Gmail account, or to access emails hosted on my personal server.
- catch23 18y ago
  what? I've never heard of that before. If employers had the right to check private email, do they also have to right to record calls made from your home? Do they also have the right to break into your home and search for materialTh
- TrevorJ 18y ago
  I find that assertion to be borderline ridiculous.
- gojomo 18y ago
  An employer has the right to check private email of an employee. It seems that the shafted guy is pissed off because he did not think that his employee status would give his opponent the right to snoop. You should qualify that: the employer has a right to view a work-provided email account, and the work-provided computer. But not all employee email. In this case, the employer's rights could hinge on whether the email accessed was sent to an @employer.com address, and whether McConnell's claimed prior agreement about a "personal partition" on the company-reimbursed laptop is substantiated.
- 1gor 18y ago
  To answer most of the sibling comments: "U.S. Court Affirms Employer's Right to Read Employees' Email" at http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-14518/U-S-Court-Affirms-Employer.html http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-14518/U-S-Court-Affi... Keeping anything private on a corporate laptop or accessing private email through corporate network does not guarantee any privacy at all. There is a company right now arguing it has right to read Yahoo email of an employee. http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/06/company_argues.html http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/06/co... I take downmodding of my comment above as a sign of righteous indignation about US privacy laws.
  - cperciva 18y ago
    U.S. Court Affirms Employer's Right to Read Employees' Email Fraser v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company is entirely irrelevant here: That case dealt with whether a company has the right to access emails stored on the company's server. There's a question of privacy there, but not one of computer crime -- Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company did not access computer systems without the owner's permission. This is manifestly different from the situation as I read it to be here, where it was being alleged that the article's author's VPN was being accessed without his permission. The Structured Settlements case is more relevant, but it fails on two counts: First, the legal theory being put forward by Structured Settlements involves them merely observing what Mr. Palma had done on one of their computers -- their claim is that they didn't access his Yahoo account, but merely saw him accessing his Yahoo account -- and second, the Structured Settlements case has yet to be tested in a courtroom. Yes, the US has very weak privacy laws, but that doesn't extend to its computer crime laws -- and accessing a computer system without authorization is a computer crime, not just a privacy violation. And of course, IANAL, the above is not legal advice, etc.