Email privacy???

Just wondering the opinion of others for this situation.
Here it is.

OK, so your working in your office and you need to print out some reports. you hear the printer working, so you go down the hall to gather the papers. The paper depth is small/or the height you know that the report will be, two or three pages. You head back to your desk to process the report. As your going through the papers to sign the areas that need signing, you discover that under your report someone had printed out a email.

So the question is:

Do you read the email? Or quickly take it back to the printer where it had been found, an for how long it was sitting there ---who knows.

 

I'd put it in an envelope then ask around

 

ok, so Zig. NOT read it.

 

I'd do the same as Zigs...put it in an envelope and find out who had used the printer before me. So no, I wouldn't read it. It's for someone else to read not me.

 

there are several printers in the building, and many people in the building. When I print out something really important, I am down the hall, at at the printer before its even done to grab it up.

 

Yep, unless it's from your boss to someone who you hate

While we'm on this, every printer has a hard drive that keeps everything thats ever been printed or scanned, so if its a hire one you're handing over everything to the hire company when you send it back unless you wipe the drive

 

OK so now we have --- a depends on who it is from. Actually this happens quite often in these offices. You go up to a printer, and find on the side stuff "someone" printed out, who knows when, and never came over to pick it up.
So this is not just the first time, for me, nor for lots of others to see email sitting there in the printer. Just wondering thoughts. By the way I read it and put it back. Keeps me in the know sometime.
Again, my take on it, is that when I print something out, I am there to grab it right away. Cause I really don't want anyone to know something about what's going on in my department.

 

and I did know that all printers make a mirror copy of what is printed, trust me no one is that savvy to want to go there. They just go back and press print again, thinking they sent it to the wrong printer.

 

Could be a good way of feeding disinformation, you wouldn't believe the fun I had when I asked a colleague when they were fitting the trackers to the company vans

 

I would read who to/from to find out who commanded it to be printed and hand it over to them. If I didn't know the party, I'd simply shred it.

 

That email could have been confidential, and even if not to an in-house company email address, it could have been to a member of staff using a private email address (as with Hilary Clinton?).

I would either:

1) Immediately destroy it, making a note of my reasons for doing so, like recipient not obvious, placing back in printer tray would be after recipient gave up checking for it, etc., or

2) Make enquiries as to intended recipient, they may not be immediately obvious, but your IT Section should be able to identify who's sent a print run to a particular printer immediately before yourself.

 

I should add to your information. from anywhere in the office areas, to any of the many printers--you can press the print button, and move off your seat, down the hall to the printer. And there are three locations of printers, so the person picks the printer the nearest to his /her office so to not walk far to get their stuff.

 

Easy answer to an easy question. I'd read it. Every time. It pays to know what's going on at work. It can make the difference between knowing to jump ship when a better opportunity arises, to being blissfully ignorant until a notice of redundancy lands on your desk the day after that other opportunity that you passed up has passed. Or it can make the difference between knowing to jump ship at the earliest opportunity, or not getting paid on the last payday before Christmas because the boss that said the company isn't struggling at all is actually skint and being chased by everyone for unpaid debts.

I wouldn't actively endeavour to snoop, but if the information is put in front of me, intentionally or not, I'm not going to put loyalty to company before loyalty to family.

As to the original question, after reading the print out, I'd then put it back.

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