NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #18/NN_1992_18.iso/spool/vmsnet/networks/tcpip/multinet/2012

Text File | 1992-08-22 | 1.8 KB | 40 lines

X-Gateway-Source-Info: INTERNET
Path: sparky!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!usc!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!ucselx!network.ucsd.edu!mvb.saic.com!tgv.com!info-multinet
Date: 22 AUG 92 19:38:36 GMT
Newsgroups: vmsnet.networks.tcp-ip.multinet
X-Return-path: <[e-mail]>
X-RFC822-From:    [e-mail] (James R. Fisher 703-648-7026)
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Postmasters and privacy
X-Vmsmail-To: inet%"[e-mail]"
Organization: The INFO-MULTINET Community
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Nntp-Posting-Host: Mvb.Saic.Com
Lines: 25

I don't know that this subject properly belongs on the Multinet
list, but I'll try anyway. I am postmaster on my host (and by
default on the whole of usgs.gov). Two questions about what a
postmaster can/should do with regard to privacy issues:

1) In a government installation like mine, there is a strict
rule that machines are to be used for government business only.
This is likely codified in federal law, but I know not where.
Similar restrictions likely also apply to commercial establishments.
In such an environment, if a postmaster accidentally/deliberately
reads the body of a mail message, could s/he properly be accused
of invading 'personal privacy' ? (Who's sleeping with whom does
not seem to be included in the category of government business,
current political campaigns aside).

2) On more than one occasion, _I_ have seen on this machine pieces
of mail which could neither be sent to the destination nor returned
to the sender. On investigation, the sender used some sort of word
processing package to construct the body, so there were lines as
long as 3000 characters. So I took the offending text into an editor
and placed hard carriage returns in the proper places, so as to
make the mail sendable. Did I invade the personal privacy of the
sender/receiver in so doing ?

-jrf