The Massachusetts Supervisor of Public Records ruled virtually all e-mail sent or received by a government employee is public record. But Council president Kelly refuses to turn his over, and vows to fight it out in court. Editor Unger says a precedent needs to be made clear. We're going to create a whole class of government existing in a subterranean level, which would be dangerous. As public and private employers debate e-mail rules, programmers may have a software solution.
New programs encrypt e-mail messages with a digital key, so they're only readable for a short time.
But the technology is unwieldy. All Rights Reserved.