Reuters: Apple was allegedly caught spying on their employee's personal devices and silencing them

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According to Reuters, an Apple employee filed a lawsuit against the tech giant alleging it invaded employees' privacy through surveillance and inspection of personal data and prevented discussions about wages and working conditions.

The company required employees to "waive their inalienable right to privacy and autonomy " as a condition of employment, agreeing to "physical, video and electronic surveillance" outside of work hours, according to the suit filed by Amar Bhakta in California State Court.

To do so, the suit says, employees would have to install software that would allow Apple to access personal devices used for work or iCloud accounts. It can be described as a "prison area" with employees constantly under surveillance, whether on the job or not.

At the same time, the suit alleges that Apple imposes a confidentiality policy that prohibits employees from discussing work conditions, including communicating with the media and engaging in the disclosure of information protected by law.

Bhakta, who has worked with Apple since 2020, said he was barred from talking about his work on the podcast and ordered to remove information about work conditions from his LinkedIn profile. Apple's surveillance policies and practices chill, and thereby also unlawfully impede, employee feedback, competition, freedom of movement of workers in the labour market and freedom of expression.

Meanwhile, Apple in a statement prepared by its spokesperson said, the allegations are baseless and explained that its employees are trained every year on their right to discuss working conditions. At Apple, we're focused on creating the best products and services in the world, and we strive to protect the inventions our teams create for customers.

The new lawsuit was filed under a unique California law that allows employees to sue employers on behalf of the state and collect 35% of any penalties obtained. We have yet to confirm other details on the news or if Apple is doing the same for all of its commercial products. Hopefully, everything will be resolved smoothly.

 

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