Recent court decisions related to employees’ online postings have centered on whether disciplinary decisions regarding those postings may violate the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The NLRA protects certain employee “concerted activities” aimed at discussing or improving working conditions, and precludes interference with such communications, including online messages. However, individuals also have brought other legal

Last month, employers received a little more help from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in formulating social media policies that pass muster under scrutiny from the Board. On October 19, 2012, the Associate General Counsel (AGC) for the NLRB’s Division of Advice provided a useful and well organized opinion in response to a request

Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) protects the right of employees to engage in “concerted activities” with each other for the purpose of collective bargaining or in efforts to improve working conditions and terms of employment. These concerted activities can be done in person, or by other methods of communication, including electronic

[With thanks to Hera Arsen, J.D., Ph.D., in our Client Services group – her more detailed explanation of this case can be found on the firm’s website at www.ogletreedeakins.com.]

The U.S. Supreme Court has held that a city police department’s search of an employee/police officer’s text messages was reasonable, and did not violate the

In an unpublished opinion, a federal district court in New Jersey has upheld a jury verdict in which a company was found liable for violating the federal Stored Communications Act (SCA). The violation occurred when the company’s managers intentionally accessed a “chat group” on an employee’s MySpace account without having received authorization from the MySpace