Ouch: Employer's Revenge
Michael Fox's recent post on a naughty employee who wiped out the hard drive on his laptop should make bitter employers happy. In this case, the employee in question allegedly used a program to erase his laptop so that his employer could not see the "no good" he was up to. According to Michael: "The employee had been hired to help his employer identify properties which it might want to acquire. After deciding to go into business for himself (in violation of his employment agreement), he deleted data from his company issued laptop, including both data that the company did not have and data which would have shown the improper conduct he engaged in. He made sure the evidence could not be recovered by loading an erasure program which by writing over the deleted files prevented recovery of the missing data."
Many employers, typically smaller employers, typically resign themselves to giving up when an employee walks off with an computer and if the employee erases information. Now I think that employers may think twice before giving up. In this case, the employer is permitted to continue with its lawsuit against the employee.