Recently, a US company fired an employee for switching off the webcam while Working from Home (WFH).
A Dutch court has ordered a US company to compensate a sacked employee for $72,700 after the employee was fired for turning the webcam off while working from home
The termination of the employee had a significant negative impact. According to the report, a telemarketing business with offices in Florida, Chetu had fired a Dutch employee for not keeping his webcam on.
Chetu is not the only company that is using monitoring software to keep a watch on its employees. A report from Digital.com revealed that around 60 percent of businesses that allow people to work from home are using this type of software to keep tabs on their productivity and job activity.
This has reportedly helped companies find out that employees waste about three to four hours daily doing non-office work.
The employee quoted that he did not feel comfortable switching on the camera for roughly nine hours each day and felt it was an invasion of privacy. However, the employee refused to obey the order and the company pressed fake charges against him.
A Dutch court has fined Chetu, saying that “requiring remote staff to keep their webcam on constitutes a human rights violation.”
The employee is working in this company since 2019 and was a resident of the Netherlands. As quoted by the court documents, he said, “This is an invasion of my privacy and makes me feel really uncomfortable. That is the reason why my camera is not on.”
The country’s court ordered the US company to pay a fine as part of compensation. As per the orders, the individual was just defending his privacy rights.
The company has been punished and had to pay a huge fine of $72,700 (around Rs 60 Lakhs) to the former remote employee.