The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a broad right of privacy for workers who send text messages on the job, ruling that supervisors may read through an employee’s communications if they suspect rules are being violated.
In a 9-0 ruling, the justices said a police chief in Ontario, Calif., did not violate the constitutional rights of an officer when he read the transcripts of sexually explicit text messages sent from the officer’s work pager.
In this case, the high court said, the police chief’s reading of the officer’s text messages was a search, but it was also reasonable.
The court’s ruling comes at a time when most U.S. workers spend at least part of their day talking on phones or sending messages on computers or cellphones, many supplied by their employers.
Full Story: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-court-worker-texting-20100618,0,7772406.story