What privacy rights to volunteers have to their "company" emails?

June 20, 2017 9:27 AM

If an unpaid, volunteer, representative is an issued an email under their name, do they have any expectation to privacy related to email communications? (can the company that gave them the email monitor or read the email communications at any time?)
posted by Unsomnambulist to Law & Government (5 answers total)

Best answer: I wouldn't assume a volunteer using an org-domain email would have any more privacy than a paid employee or contractor. Basically, the email belongs to the org, so they can monitor.

This is apparently settled caselaw, at least in the US.
posted by uberchet at 9:30 AM on June 20, 2017 [8 favorites]

Best answer: It will vary by locality, but in general, they should assume they do not have privacy rights unless explicitly granted them by the organization.
posted by Candleman at 9:32 AM on June 20, 2017 [3 favorites]

1. No
2. Maybe
posted by rhizome at 9:55 AM on June 20, 2017

The only possible exception here is that if your organization is a college/university, they may be covered by FERPA.

Both times I've worked for a large university I've been told that it was way too much trouble to have separate e-mail systems for staff and faculty/students so they have a blanket policy of not reading e-mail without a subpoena/court order.
posted by Oktober at 1:40 PM on June 20, 2017

Volunteers would fall under the same policy as paid employees given a company email. If your staff members have an expectation of privacy, volunteers do too; if the Employee Handbook states that employees have no expectation of privacy, the Volunteer Handbook should say the same thing. Generally speaking, work email addresses are subject to company oversight, but there's wiggle room if that's not spelled out. (I'm a Certified Volunteer Administrator, but not a lawyer or HR specialist.)
posted by AliceBlue at 3:51 PM on June 21, 2017 [1 favorite]