As part of our value-added client service programme, Țuca Zbârcea & Asociații regularly host bespoke events for the firm’s clients and other interested parties.
Our public speaking events have always aimed at creating a platform for debate, as well as trying to find solutions to legal issues that weigh on our clients’ minds. Drawing on their experience, our lawyers and consultants are genuinely interested in interacting with broad audiences in order to convene people from divergent economic sectors so as to reach desirable answers for the debated subjects. Our latest seminar, “Monitoring vs. Privacy of the Employees at the Workplace. Current Legal Dilemmas and Practical Solutions”, took place on 31 May at the Cesianu-Racoviță Palace (the Artmark Galleries), and it proved to serve its purpose. As a fair balance between the employer’s interests and the employee’s right to privacy is an extremely delicate issue, that might often give rise to numerous predicaments and controversies, we found it necessary for a discussion to be carried out in this regard. Moreover, recent enactments, such as the EU Regulation concerning data processing (i.e., the ECHR judgement in the Bărbulescu vs. Romania case), provided for a good occasion to comment on the impact of the latest case-laws in this matter. Along with the Țuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii team (Bogdan Halcu, Managing Associate; Ciprian Timofte, Managing Associate; and Sergiu Crețu, Senior Associate) specialising in data protection, speakers and representatives of the National Supervisory Authority for Personal Data Processing (ANSPDCP) took lead in the presentation and the ensuing discussions. Since its announcement, the event has quickly gained people’s interest and thus approximately 50 legal advisors, Human Resources managers, directors of internal audit (compliance) and specialists in the legal, administrative and even IT fields have joined our speakers, all interested in strengthening their knowledge on data privacy in relation to monitoring employees. The debate was highly appreciated, as the relevant news in the field were combined with case studies at hand. Not only did this discussion bring an insightful overview upon recently enacted regulations, but it also raised a well-based round of Q&A that helped put people’s mind at ease when applying the knowledge to their specific work situation. Most of the discussion was focused on matters concerning principles and general rules for monitoring employees, such as consent to monitoring and the need to provide this consent, internet and e-mail monitoring, video and audio monitoring at the workplace, GPS, and electronic access systems, from a legal and moral perspective.
This article was first published in Just in Case, an electronic magazine by Țuca Zbârcea & Asociații. To read the entire article, please go to: http://www.tuca.ro/just_in_case/