NLRB Expands Employees’ Use Of Email For Protected Activity

The National Labor Relations Board ("NLRB" or the "Board") has yet again expanded employees' rights to discuss the terms and conditions of their employment or otherwise engage in protected activity. In Purple Communications, Inc. and Communications Workers of America, AFL-CIO, the NLRB held that employees who already have access to their employers' email systems through work must be allowed to use the email systems to engage in protected communications about the terms and conditions of their employment on nonworking time. This decision overrules the NLRB's 2007 Register Guard decision to the extent that it held that employees do not have a right to use their employers' email systems for such purposes.