Spanish Court Ruling Validates Employee Monitoring

Spain's constitutional court, the Tribunal Constitucional, made a landmark ruling in the case of Pérez González v. Alcaliber S.A. in early October, finding that companies are permitted to access and monitor employee communications via company IT resources, including emails and texts, as part of investigations into employee misconduct.

Pérez González was dismissed by Alcaliber for disseminating trade secrets to competitors.  Alcaliber accessed Pérez González' company emails and laptop hard drive in the presence of the notary public following suspicions of wrongdoing to confirm grounds for dismissal. Emails in both 2007 and 2008 were found to confirm suspicions that Pérez González had disclosed information about the year's poppy crops from his company account to a competitor of Alcaliber.