Privacy Issues in the Community College Workplace

Because the Supreme Court did not determine whether Quon had a reasonable expectation of privacy over his text messages, this case should serve as a reminder to employers that they should adopt written policies that put employees on notice that they do not have an expectation of privacy in their electronic communications sent or received via employer property. The policy should also use language broad enough to encompass current and emerging forms of electronic communications used in the workplace. Notably, the Court's decision only reviewed the Fourth Amendment arguments. The Court did not grant certiorari to review the Ninth Circuit's holding that Arch Wireless violated the Stored Communications Act by providing the City with transcripts of Quon's text messages. Thus, that portion of the Ninth Circuit's decision stands. Because the Stored Communications Act prohibits third party Electronic Communications Services from disclosing archived messages except to an addressee or intended recipient of such communication, we recommend that employers obtain a written and signed release from all employees that allows the employer access to such communications before they issue the equipment to employees. Crispin v. Christian Audigier, Inc. 398 A federal district court in California held that Stored Communication Act prohibits “electronic communication service providers” from divulging, either voluntarily or in response to a subpoena, private messages communicated via social networking sites that are not readily accessible to the public. Riley v. California 399 The United States Supreme Court unanimously found that law enforcement must generally obtain a search warrant before searching digital information contained on a cell phone seized from an arrested individual. Riley involves two cases, one involving a smartphone and the other involving a flip phone. In each case, an individual was arrested for allegedly violating the law and as part of the arrest, his cell phone was seized. The officers in each case conducted warrantless searches of the cell phones and uncovered information that exposed additional criminal activity. In one case, the content of the seized smartphone revealed text messages with possible gang affiliations, videos of young men sparring while someone yelled gang words, and a photograph of the arrestee in front of a car suspected to have been involved in a shooting a few weeks earlier. The arrestee was linked to the prior shooting based upon the information found on his cell phone.

In the other case, the flip phone seized from the arrestee repeatedly received calls from a source identified as “my house” on the phone’s outside screen.

Privacy Issues in the Community College Workplace ©2021 (c) Liebert Cassidy Whitmore 128