In many companies, WhatsApp groups or from any other social network, they have adopted the role of a communication board, from which the company or those responsible for employees They organize shiftsroutes or vacations of its employees from a single channel.
However, despite being very convenient for the organization of the company, adding employees to These groups It is an exhibition of your private data. Is it legal that the company includes you in one of these Work groups of work? The answer: depends d.
Use of WhatsApp on personal mobiles
The Spanish Agency for Data Protection, supported by a sentence of the 2019 National Court established the pillars of the use of mobile devices in the workplace, indicating that employees are not obliged to use or install applications for professional use.
That is, if the mobile in which the line that will be included in the WhatsApp group is personal, or the line itself is, is installed, or The company cannot force the worker to be part of the group.
Including that number in a WhatsApp group without the express consent of the employee would violate article 5 of the Organic Law 3/2018, of December 5, on the Protection of Personal Data and guarantee of digital rightsviolating the right to individual privacy.
The legal protection of this assumption was reinforced with the arrival of the Teleworking 10/2021that in its article 17.2 it indicates that it is the company who must provide any material or device that employees may need to develop their work. If to develop that work, the employee needs a mobile with line for communications with the company, or for the time registrationyou must facilitate it.
Use of WhatsApp in the company’s mobile
The scenario changes completely when the mobile or line is owned by the company, not the employee. In that case, the company can use that resource as it creates convenient and may include those lines in a WhatsApp group, without the employee being able to refuse to it. This use is part of the organization of work by the company according to the Workers Statute.
However, the company must justify the group’s need, assume the cost of the line and establish clear rules on its use.
Right to digital disconnection
In any case, whether the mobile is personal and has the employee’s consent, as if it is a corporate mobile, The right to digital disconnection must be respectedas established in article 20 bis of the Statute of Workers and in article 18 of the Teleworking Law.
This section specifically indicates: “Workers have the right to privacy in the use of digital devices made available to the employer, to digital disconnection and intimacy in the use of video surveillance and geolocation devices in the established terms in current legislation on personal data protection and guarantee of digital rights. “
This means that, in any of the cases, the worker is not obliged to answer Out of your working hours, unless it is subject to any of the exceptions due to justified urgency.
This right is protected by various labor laws and their breach would result in economic sanctions for the company that could range between 751 euros and 7,500 euros.
Image | Unspash (Dimitri Karastelev)