Alex O’Neill, solicitor for Lawlink, answers a readers query.
Q. I recently attended my office Christmas party, where a colleague was taking photos all night. Following the event, pictures of me were posted on Facebook that showed me in a less than flattering light. Colleagues in the office are also making very nasty remarks about me. I think the photos undermine my professional standing and I am worried that my employers or clients of the office will see them. Can I do anything to force my colleague to take these pictures down?
Dear Reader,
A. These kinds of issues are becoming all the more prevalent with the increasing popularity of Facebook and its wide reach.
One of the first things any employee should do when trying to work out the appropriate course of action in an employment situation, is to refer to their contract of employment, terms and conditions of employment and/or any office handbooks that may exist. These documents should contain any policy and procedure your employer may have regarding internet use and social networking sites.
Increasingly, employers are including comprehensive policies covering this area. A good policy will include provisions such as a general prohibition on posting photographs from work events, such as work related Christmas parties, as these types of photographs can cause reputational damage both to the employee and to the business. If your company has such a policy then you may be best to approach your colleague pointing out the policy and suggesting that the photos are taken down, otherwise you will be initiating a complaint against them using the company’s formal complaints or grievance procedure. This should be enough to make your colleague see the importance of not posting pictures of work related events and hopefully deal with the issue without you having to raise a formal grievance which, I appreciate, would be difficult for you, given that you do not want your employers to see these photos.
Even if there is no formal internet policy, most contracts will contain clauses dealing with the reputation of the business and this could be broadly interpreted to cover these types of situations.
For the sake of employers and employees, even where a formal policy is not in place, employers should, prior to work events, communicate with employees, reminding them of their colleague’s right to privacy and the importance of the company’s reputation being protected, even in social settings. That way every one can enjoy the festivities without any undesirable consequences.
Turning then to the use of Facebook, while users may ‘own’ the information and content they post to social networking sites, once posted, that ownership may become meaningless. Users of social networking sites are responsible for deciding what they upload for sharing. The issue then becomes: who can see and use that information? Even though they may not read it, when a user registers with Facebook (or any other social networking website) they are bound by its terms and conditions (including its privacy policy). Facebook users are given the responsibility of monitoring their own privacy settings. Facebook provides privacy controls by which users can customise settings to control which people, websites and applications can see their information. The default setting is “everyone”.
Facebook’s Privacy Policy states that if the user leaves the default privacy settings as “everyone”, then the information becomes publicly available information, and may be accessed by everyone on the internet (not just Facebook users), be indexed by search engines, and imported, exported, distributed and redistributed by anyone without any privacy limitations in place. Similarly, Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities provides that when you publish content or information using the “everyone” setting, it means that the user allows everyone (including people outside of Facebook) to access and use that information, and to associate it with them. In copyright terms, the “everyone” setting appears to gives rise to a broad licence, granted by the user, to all of the world. And it is not clear whether (and on what terms) this licence may be revoked.
Therefore, you should monitor your privacy setting on your own page to deal with the dissemination of your picture.
Your Questions
Send your legal queries to lawlink@alexoneill.ie or by post to Alex O’Neill Solicitors 22 Barrington Street, Limerick. We aim to deal with a representative sample of queries received. The column is a reader’s service and is not intended to replace professional advice. No individual correspondence will be entered into.
