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SMEs need e-mail policies too

By Damaria Senne, ITWeb senior journalist
Johannesburg, 20 Apr 2007

Small and medium enterprise must take proactive action to protect against the liability that arises out employees' abuse of e-mail, says Buys director, Reinhardt Buys.

Speaking at the Small and Medium Business Forum, hosted by BMI-TechKnowledge in Midrand this week, Buys said in many instances the law holds the company liable for an employee's abuse of e-mail.

When the case is heard, the company will be required to show it took measures to prevent the illegal act, and that it acted swiftly once a problem was identified, he says.

Buys outlined a number of liability problems, which a company could have prevented if an e-communication or e-mail policy was in place.

These included instances where employers were found liable after an employee was found guilty of distributing racist, sexually discriminatory or religiously offensive e-mails. "Employers are obligated to provide an enabling work environment free of discrimination."

If an employee uses the company's equipment to download pictures and infringe on someone else's copyright, the employer can also be held liable and sued, unless it can prove that reasonable measures were put in place to prevent such an activity, and the employee circumvented them.

Buys also urges employers to keep critical e-mails for at least a year, as they have evidential weight in case of a dispute. He also warns that such e-mails should be kept in their original form, as changing the form (eg, saving them as PDF documents) lose them their capacity to be presented as evidence.

An employer must also have a staff member's written consent before intercepting employees' e-mails, he adds.

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