From: exuptr@exu.ericsson.se (exuptr@exu.ericsson.se)
Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy,alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,misc.legal.computing
Subject: Re: Article on E-mail Privacy/Snooping
Keywords: Corporate Computing, September 1992
Date: 13 Sep 92 22:28:19 GMT
Organization: Ericsson Network Systems, Inc.

In article <1992Sep11.234228.25430@qiclab.scn.rain.com> leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com (Leonard Erickson) writes:
>From: leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
>Subject: Re: Article on E-mail Privacy/Snooping
>Keywords: Corporate Computing, September 1992
>Date: 11 Sep 92 23:42:28 GMT

>joet@dcatlas.dot.gov (Joe Trott) writes:

>>jpglori@srv.PacBell.COM (John P. Gloria) writes:

>>>Apparently when Wang resigned, his MCI Mail account was closed.  According
>>>to the paper, MCI Mail saves messages for five days and then deleted. All
>>>these came to light when a staff worker was closing the account and "looked"
>>>into Wang's account and was suprised on the contents of the messages.  This
>>>started court orders to search offices/residences on both parties. 

>>>Question:  did the staff worker have the RIGHT to read Wang's email?
>>>When I close accounts, I tar everything to tape and then remove everything.
>>>I don't have time to read user's files or email that is still in queue.

>>No, he did *not* have the right (unless a prior contract specified otherwise)
>>to view Wang's email.  He should be prosecuted, found as guilty as he is,
>>and treated as harshly as possible.  That said, the evidence that Wang was
>>involved in crimes of his own *exists*.  It cannot be ignored.  Two wrongs
>>do not make a right.  Wang should also be tried, convicted, and probably
>>shot ("if you don't like the consequences of your actions...").

>When i was one of the LAN administrators for a medium sized company, we
>didn't *have* a policy on such things (though we were agitating to get
>the higher ups to *set* one)

>What we did when closing a user account was nuke the email, make a quick
>pass through their directories and nuke anything that appeared to be personal,
>and make a scan for files marked as being owned by them elsewhere. 

>After cleaning up the "personal" stuff, and nuking "irrelevant" stuff
>(like config files for various programs), any remaining files were referred
>to their supervisor to see if they were "needed". (ie for their replacement
>or as general company data, sday a process spec the person had been writing).

>Anything that wasn't "needed" got nuked. 

>Yes, we read "private" files. But it was our job to cleanup the account,
>and better *us* than their supervisor! I frankly couldn't have told you
>the next day what had been in 90% of the files that got deleted as 
>"personal". 

>In fact as I had occasion to tell users who were worried about the fact that
>I could read any file on the LAN "There are something like 4 gigabytes of
>files out there. *Thousands* of them. Even if I *wanted* to snoop, there's
>too much to go thru!"


There's another point here - there are more appropriate places for "private" 
stuff than company property, or company-paid accounts.  IMHO, if you want 
something to be private, encrypt it, or keep it in a private place.

IOW, leave your resumes at home ;-)
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