Moral Diremma-should he have deleted the files

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one of my friends like to relax after a hard days work, and his passion is sitting down infront of the pc and visit adult sites for good relaxing adult stories. when he likes a story, he saves it on his pc for future reading, one time when he was away, a morally upright coleague went into his personal folders at the pretext of looking for something he wanted, and on finding the mouthwatering stories, deleted all of his collection. on top of that he went to his boss. on coming back the boss was lightabout it but the saint had a whip in hand. the question is, was the colleague right to delete the stories.

Topic

No

In reply to Moral Diremma-should he have deleted the files

Pretext or otherwise, there is always the chance that someone is going to have to access your personal data at sometime – say you get hit by a bus and they need to redistibute your work and get to grips with what you were doing. the workplace is a communal area, and there needs to be some accepted standards of behaviour so that noone is offended or made to feel uncomfortable by the actions of someone else. personally I have nothing against porn – which text or otherwise is what we are talking about here – but like smoking or swearing we need to consider the effect on others and modify our behaviour accordingly. That’s not to say we should go to extremes for people who have very extreme ideas, some common sense should come into play – but common sense should tell anyone that surfing for porn at work is not acceptable behaviour. When your ‘friend’ is at home he can wear womens underwear and download pictures of gay camels getting it on if he feels like it – nobody’s business but his. But NOT in the workplace….

On a company PC

In reply to Moral Diremma-should he have deleted the files

If this was on a company PC in a work-place, the employee was wrong to delete the files.

However, the person with the files was EVEN more in the wrong!

Your company needs a clear policy on the proper business use of computers.

In the US, your firm could be subject to a number of lawsuits for allowing ANY employee to store ANY adult content on a company PC.

Chas

They are missing the point

In reply to Moral Diremma-should he have deleted the files

Whether the content should have been there or not is moot. That point would be determined by company policy. Whether the files should have been deleted or not is actually a secondary issue. The root infraction here is the unauthorized access. Unless this is a common-use PC in an open area, there are only two people who should even think about using it: that employee’s boss and a tech/repair person.
If I were that persons’ boss, I would have told the snoop to, first, mind his own business and reprimanded him/her for unauthorized access.

Ralph

Company policy aside

In reply to Moral Diremma-should he have deleted the files

Company policy aside, the general “rules” for PC use at work in most places are:
-NO usage of a company PC for personal things
_NO touching another’s PC without permission

Work places that I know FIRE people for breaking these rules. These are the generally accepted “rules” in the new millenium.
Some people even have to sign an agreement to these when starting a position with a company- especially where there is sensitive data or in government work.

Not done on company time ….

In reply to Moral Diremma-should he have deleted the files

Note the wording in the question:
“one of my friends like to relax after a hard days work, and his passion is sitting down infront of the pc and visit adult sites for good relaxing adult stories.”
So what’s the problem with using a company computer AFTER you have put in your agreed hours?

My nephew (a Unix Systems Administrator) writes emails to me on his work computer AFTER working hours, because he doesn’t have an Internet connection at home.

Personally I think that the “snoop” is the deviant in this case. He shouldn’t have been prowling through his workmates’s files, and he should have first informed the fellow if he considered the files represented illicit use of a company computer.

still company property after hours

In reply to Not done on company time ….

Regardless of when the improper use took place, the computer is still the property of the employer. The company is responsible for the contents of that computer. If a coworker sees the ‘adult’ content, and is offended, the company is liable.

I’m curious how the coworker accessed the computer. Is it a shared computer? If not, how did they gain access? If so, then they had every right to look for whatever they thought they needed to.

I suspose it all boils down to who had

In reply to still company property after hours

Admin Priviliges if any in this case. While the original peron in question was wrong the person who accessed the computer illectily was also in the wrong and if there was something incripted within these files it just may have proved to adversely affect the company. I know of many people who hide very sensitive Company Info inside what would appear non-related files to the companies business and yes even though I’m personally against the idea I’ve seen some very sensitive files encrypted inside a soft porn folder and would prove almost impossible to replace.

There are two wrongs here firstly unless other wise allowed this stuff should never have been on the HD in the first place but of greater concern is how was this data accessed? And why?

Sorry but this reaks of company politics to me with one person attempting to take the moral high ground to justify their illegial action. If it was my business the one who deleted the files would be instantly dismissed {provided that this was not a comunal computer} and the peron who added this content would have some very lenghty explaining to perform and possibly be facing some form of disapilinary action but then again I would have wanted to see what was so offensive and not have someone else judge it for me.

Maybe I’m wrong but it should be the senior managment who makes these decissions not some one of lower or equial ranking.

Anyone got a comment on this?

No

In reply to Moral Diremma-should he have deleted the files

If the saint wanted to push it then he will require proof – otherwise his word against colleague – so dont delete – inform boss.

If saint had concerns – leave alone tell boss, let him decide.

If saint had no problems with it – then he wouldnt delete it

so overall answer is no

[Author]

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