When star dog trainer Kang Hyung-wook was accused by his employees of mistreating and bullying them at work in May, the core allegation was that Kang had been monitoring staff messenger conversations and using surveillance cameras. The dispute between Kang and his former employees has sparked a debate about the appropriateness and legality of employers monitoring workplace messengers. Should management have the right to monitor employee communications? While companies may argue that such monitoring protects company interests, employees feel it infringes on their privacy and creates an atmosphere of distrust in the workplace.
According to labor attorney Ju Hyun-jong, if the company introduces a system to facilitate work-related communication, the authority to manage it can be considered the company’s. However, the individual employees are the actual users, so employees' rights should also be taken into account. “Taking these factors into consideration, a separate, specific review of individual cases would be needed to determine whether there are any violations of the Personal Information Protection Act,” Ju said.
“We recently started using the Microsoft Teams messenger and I am aware the management can monitor it,” said Park, an employee at local fashion company LF who asked to be identified only by his surname. “But I don’t expect my boss to look into mine unless there is a legitimate reason to do so.” Park explained that "legitimate reasons," in his view, inc.
