Dismissal of an employee for private internet use

The employer is entitled to analyse the browser history of the employee's work computer in order to establish the facts of the case for dismissal without the employee's consent. This was decided by the Berlin-Brandenburg Regional Labour Court.

The employer had provided the employee with a business computer for work purposes; the employee was only allowed to use the internet privately in exceptional cases during work breaks. After there were indications of a considerable private use of the internet, the employer analysed the browser history of the business computer without the employee's consent. He then terminated the employment relationship for cause due to the ascertained private use of a total of approximately five days in a period of 30 working days.

The Regional Labour Court held that the extraordinary dismissal was legally valid. After weighing the interests of both parties, the unauthorised use of the internet justified the immediate termination of the employment relationship. With regard to the browser history, the employer was not prohibited from using the evidence. It was true that this was personal data which the employee had not consented to monitor. However, the use of the data was permissible because the Federal Data Protection Act allowed the storage and analysis of the browser history for the purpose of monitoring abuse even without such consent and the employer had had no possibility in the present case to prove the extent of the unauthorised internet use by other means.

The Regional Labour Court allowed the appeal to the Federal Labour Court.

 

Berlin-Brandenburg Regional Labour Court, Judgment of 14.01.2016 - 5 Sa 657/15

 

Source: Press release of the Berlin-Brandenburg Regional Labour Court No. 9/16 of 12.02.2016

 

Goldberg Attorneys at Law 2016

Attorney at Law Michael Ullrich, LL.M. (Information Law)

Specialist lawyer for information technology law

E-mail: info@goldberg.de

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