United States: Connecticut Enacts Employee Online Privacy Law

On May 19, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy signed into law Public Act No. 15-6, titled “An Act Concerning Employee Online Privacy” (the act). The act applies to both employees and job applicants and prohibits employers from requiring or requesting employees or applicants to (1) provide the employer with a user name, password, or other means to access the employee’s or applicant’s personal online account (such as e-mail, social media and retail-based Internet websites); (2) […]

By | May 23rd, 2015 ||

UK: Financial Services Report Finds ‘Widespread Disregard For Ethics’

A survey of more than 1,200 professionals in the UK and US financial service sectors has found a worrying disregard for ethics and the protection of whistleblowers.

The survey, a collaborative effort by the University of Notre Dame and law firm Labaton Sucharow, polled 1,223 professionals from the financial services sector in the UK and US. Those surveyed represented ‘a broad spectrum of the industry, from young professionals to senior executives’.

The findings indicate a significant […]

By | May 21st, 2015 ||

United States: Fourth Circuit Court Of Appeals Holds Hostile Work Environment Can Be Created With A Single Racial Epithet

Executive Summary:
Despite consistent direction from the United States Supreme Court that courts should look at “all the circumstances” in determining whether a workplace environment is sufficiently hostile or abusive to give rise to an actionable claim of harassment, see, e.g., Faragher v. City of Boca Raton (1998), the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has held that a supervisor who called an African-American employee a “porch monkey” twice in a 24–hour period transformed the workplace […]

By | May 21st, 2015 ||