
Employee sues Google for 'illegal' confidentiality policies - betolink
https://www.engadget.com/2016/12/20/employee-sues-google-for-illegal-confidentiality-policies/
======
randomdrake
The article doesn't mention all of the alleged offenses regarding the lawsuit.
There's definitely more than just a "spying program" here:

* Restrict the Googlers’ right to speak, right to work, and right to whistle-blow.

* Prohibit Googlers from speaking plainly – even internally – about illegal conduct or dangerous product defects, because such statements might one day be subject to discovery in litigation or sought by the government.

* Prohibit Googlers from telling a potential employer how much money they make, or what work they performed, when searching for a different job.

* Prohibit Googlers from using or disclosing all of the skills knowledge, acquaintances, and overall experience at Google when working for a new employer.

* Prohibit Googlers from speaking to the government, attorneys, or the press about wrongdoing at Google.

* The policies even prohibit Googlers from speaking to their spouse or friends about whether they think their boss could do a better job.

There were alleged training practices, policies, and documents outlining these
offenses and they are written up pretty plainly in the suit itself[1]. Makes
for better, more detailed reading, than this Engadget piece.

[1] - [http://www.bakerlp.com/Google-Blackout-
Case/2016-12-19-PAGA-...](http://www.bakerlp.com/Google-Blackout-
Case/2016-12-19-PAGA-Complaint-Against-Google.pdf)

~~~
vitus
That's interesting, a clause in my contract (pulled up the PDF just now; dated
prior to the suit in question) explicitly states that the confidentiality
agreement does _not_ apply to my ability to discuss "terms, wages, and working
conditions of employment, as protected by applicable law".

That certainly contradicts several of those points.

~~~
randomdrake
The suit goes into much more than just a confidentiality agreement. It doesn't
allege that only the agreement is the source for those points.

The evidence and facts brought up are:

1) A quote from his offer letter.

2) The confidentiality agreement.

3) A Code of Conduct policy for "internal purposes only."

4) Data Classification Guidelines.

6) Employee Communication Policy.

7) Training programs including one called "You Said What?"

8) "Prepare to leave Google" policy.

9) "Exit Certification" note upon termination.

10) A "Global Investigations Team" led by Brian Katz.

11) "Stopleaks."

12) Quotes from all hands meetings.

13) Alleged amendment of a policy in response to his letter to Labor Workforce
and Development Agency violations.

~~~
jasoncheng
14) Literally getting fired for discussing terms, wages, and working
conditions of employment

15) Lawyers telling employees to STFU on discussion threads about legal
problems in the news

~~~
oh_sigh
Who got fired for that?

We have people who started a spreadsheet where googlers can post their
salary/total comp and they are still working at google.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
The _former_ Googler who started that spreadsheet faced retaliation from
management for that spreadsheet, actually.

"Former Google employee Erica Baker revealed in a flurry of messages on
Twitter Friday that she faced retaliation from management after compiling a
spreadsheet of employee salaries."

[http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/07/21/ex-google-employee-
ex...](http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/07/21/ex-google-employee-exposes-
unequal-pay-with-spreadsheet/)

~~~
oh_sigh
That was one side of the story - presumably there is another side of the
story. Since she left, there is another spreadsheet going around, and the
maintainers are all still working at google AFAIK

------
stuckagain
This complaint seems pretty silly. Just taking a single point, paragraph 45:

“Don’t send an e-mail that says ‘I think we broke the law’ or ‘I think we
violated this contract.’”

That seems like pretty reasonable training. You shouldn't put that on the
record because you're not an attorney. You are just some Dork, or Senior Dork,
or Staff Dork, or whatever grade of Dork you happen to be who is still not an
attorney.

Maybe the attorneys also have to take training that advises them not to say "I
think this dereference might be undefined behavior" in emails. Who knows.

~~~
onion2k
Why not though? What's wrong with it? In the case where the employee is wrong
then nothing happens besides, maybe, some negative news stories if it's
leaked. That's reasonably controllable. On the other hand though, if the
employee is actually correct, then the employer is protected from any claim
they were informed about the illegal activity if employees don't use language
that says they think wrongdoing is going on. Should employees work under
threat of breaking rules designed to protect their employer if the employer is
breaking the law? I don't think so.

~~~
sangnoir
> Why not though? What's wrong with it?

One of the reasons is jury trials: such emails are discoverable and Google has
first-hand experience with this in Oracle v. Google. Oracle brought an email
sent by a non-lawyer technical Googler[1] and used it as evidence that Google
_knowingly_ infringed on Oracle's copyright. Googles lawyers had to go to
great pains to deflect that line of attack (including asking the guy if he was
a lawyer on the stand as Oracle's hostile witness).

Even if the email is wrong, it still looks bad to someone who does not
understand the nuance of law, like members of the jury.

1\. [http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/05/apache-e-mails-
sh...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/05/apache-e-mails-shown-in-
court-say-android-ripped-off-oracle-ip/)

~~~
josho
This is corporate policy to protect the corporation. It is power gone too far.
People need to know that it's ok to speak up when something wrong occurs.

For example, If I were to see Jimmy stealing some GoogleBot servers then
absolutely the company would want me to inform them about Jimmy's actions.
Communication is largely done by email. So, there is no problem reporting
illegal activity by email.

But, that's not what the corporation is fearful of, they are afraid of Jimmy's
department which is infringing Big Corp.'s Patents. If I see this and email
the company then the company has to respond with an inquiry to their lawyer
and investigate, otherwise this could come out later in a court trial and
cause financial harm. So the company doesn't want people to do what they
believe is right. Oh sure, we can still report it verbally. But, that's absurd
to have a policy that says email is fine for all communications except for
anything that could potentially be detrimental to the company. What if I was
harassed at work, I'm not supposed to say anything about that in email, it all
has to be done face to face?

I hope this case wins, I hope that folks here understand that it's important
to do what's right and not to do what their corporation tells them is right.

~~~
md_
As I said above, most corporations advise employees to raise legal concerns to
lawyers. This makes those concerns privileged _and_ ensures the concerns go to
people who can, you know, professionally evaluate them.

So I don't think you can reasonably say this is a case of companies not
wanting illegality to be disclosed. It's wanting disclosure to take the proper
form.

(Indeed, they have a vested interest in proper handling of illegality to
ensure that higher-ups are aware of and can mitigate legal risks.)

------
JamilD
> Apparently, the tech giant has a “Stop Leaks” program in place that is
> managed through an internal website. Employees have the option of reporting
> a colleague to superiors, which then look into the matter and fire the
> whistleblower if the report is true.

Not all leaks are made in the sprit of "whistleblowing". This article seems
pretty misleading… many of these measures are designed to protect the
company's intellectual property and secrecy, though I see how they can be
abused. I would hardly call it a 'spying program' though.

~~~
stuckagain
Indeed, the leak in question seems to be this transcript of internal company-
wide forum: [http://www.recode.net/2016/4/13/11586092/tony-fadell-nest-
go...](http://www.recode.net/2016/4/13/11586092/tony-fadell-nest-google-tgif)

Which does not appear to be any kind of public service.

------
alexbanks
> If successful, the state would collect 75 percent of the penalty, while the
> rest would be paid out over to the company's 65,000 employees. Since there
> are 12 alleged violations in the suit, the maximum fine could amount to $3.8
> billion, with each employee getting about $14,600.

14k per employee. That's quite a payout.

~~~
bobedybobbob
Is that global or just the employees in California?

~~~
londons_explore
It won't apply outside the USA. International people never get such payouts,
yet get the same treatment

~~~
vitus
That said, the headcount reported in Alphabet's last quarterly statement to
investors was ~69k, but it depends what this 65k figure includes (temps /
vendors / contractors? interns? past employees?). If it's just straight-up
fulltime employees, then that's certainly not just California. And the payouts
might vary from state to state -- a number of these claimed labor violations
cite California law.

(Of course, I'm doubtful that any general payout is coming around.)

------
fsaneq2
> If successful, the state would collect 75 percent of the penalty, while the
> rest would be paid out over to the company's 65,000 employees

What is the logic for the state somehow being entitled to such a huge cut?
Presumably, if anyone was wronged here, it was the employees.

~~~
GabrielF00
IANAL but skimming through the complaint, they're basically acting as a
"private attorney general". The lawsuit alleges that Google's policies violate
state law. Normally, the state would sue the company, but in this case, the
law firm is saying that they'll handle the enforcement for the state. If
they're successful, they get a percentage of the penalty.

I don't know how damages are divided up in cases like these, but I'd guess
that the state's cut would be distributed (at least partially) to affected
employees.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
And this would be a choice by the lawyers in how to file this case, as opposed
to some sort of civil suit.

~~~
Sniffnoy
See paragraph 66:

> Because Google requires Googlers to waive their right to seek class-wide
> injunctive relief for Google’s illegal conduct, the only effective remedy to
> address Google’s illegal conduct is the aggressive and full imposition of
> penalties under the Private Attorneys General Act.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
I'd be quite curious if that clause would hold up in court. Forcing employees
to give up their right to seek relief for employer misconduct almost certainly
is illegal... right?

------
drewg123
Google has an incredibly secretive culture. Secrecy was drilled into us time
and again. When collaborating with external vendors, it was quite painful to
strike compromise between corporate secrecy and sharing enough information to
be productive.

After leaving Google, I'm always amazed at what I'm allowed to talk about with
vendors. I'll start talking in my Google-conditioned non-committal cagey way,
and a colleague will remind me that I'm not at Google anymore, and I can just
say what I mean.

------
gdulli
> "Google's motto is 'don't be evil.' Google's illegal confidentiality
> agreements and policies fail this test," the lawsuit said.

It occurs to me only now that a company that wasn't evil wouldn't need to make
such a show of stating it like this.

~~~
givinguflac
Even better, they've since changed the slogan, citing it as being silly.

~~~
rifung
I don't know anything about it being a slogan, but it's in the Code of Conduct
still.

I just started at Google and had to sign it.

~~~
theandrewbailey
According to the OP, you're going to get fired.

------
chappi42
Quite schizophrenic of the company to open up every information/book/news they
can crawl and on the other hand close down the little interior world as much
as possible. Not that this would be news or unexpected though.

------
harry8
People commenting on this who work for google or hope to probably should say
so in their comment.

------
yeukhon
"According to the lawsuit, Google’s policies don’t allow employees to discuss
work-related topics including salaries, to post their personal opinions about
the company online, and must not leak any product or other Google related
information to the public. If Googlers break the company’s rules, they just
might end up getting fired."

I have read several blog posts of Googlers about their work experience on
their own blogs. If leaking unannounced works to the public, that's definitely
a standard how work should be treated.

So I'd want to hear more about exactly what's going on. A "spy program" is a
catchy phrase to grab reader attention. I think anyone should report if they
spot anything against the interest of company such as insider trading, violate
NDA etc, especially given Google is publicly traded.

~~~
wnevets
>Google’s policies don’t allow employees to discuss work-related topics
including salaries

isn't this illegal?

~~~
neild
My understanding is that employers may not hinder employees in discussing
salaries among themselves, but may impose restrictions on providing salary
information to non-employees.

So I can tell another Googler my salary but I can't tell you (unless you're a
Googler) because my NDA forbids it. I'm pretty certain that I'm allowed to
tell you that I'm not allowed to tell you, though. :)

There's an internal site where a number of Googlers share their compensation,
anonymously or otherwise. I've never received any indication of disapproval or
retaliation from management for being on it.

(I am not a lawyer, standard disclaimer applies.)

~~~
user5994461
No need to give numbers. Just tell us your city and your job title and we'll
look it up on the secret salary list :D

[http://h1bdata.info/index.php?em=Google&job=&city=&year=2016](http://h1bdata.info/index.php?em=Google&job=&city=&year=2016)

P.S. Add 10% for non-H1B workers.

------
dunkelheit
I've seen several Google employees comment on this site even on matters
related to Google. How do they bring up the courage to do this? Seems pretty
risky as per this "Confidentiality Agreement".

~~~
tantalor
Only comment on things that have been publicly announced/published, don't
comment on leaks or make new ones.

(I work for Google)

------
deadmik3
>In addition, John Doe is also stating that Brian Katz, the director of global
investigations, intelligence, and protective services over at Google, has
falsely accused him of leaking information to the media.

Doesn't seem like a false accusation to me...

------
nunez
Right, so I don't remember having any such language (don't disclose your
salary or your work) in my departure paperwork. I was a SA in a SRE team. Does
this apply to people in X?

That said, Google has a VERY restrictive IP a policy that effectively
prohibits employees from running side businesses at ANY time during their
employment on ANY medium, Google-owned or not. Anything you make is Google's.

~~~
DannyBee
"That said, Google has a VERY restrictive IP a policy that effectively
prohibits employees from running side businesses at ANY time during their
employment on ANY medium, Google-owned or not. Anything you make is Google's.
"

Actually, this is pretty much 100% false (I help run the invention assignment
committee, so ...). We let it happen all the time, and in fact, grant people
the IP to do it. This is significantly better than most companies, who pretty
much don't tell you, and then if you come up with something cool, will sue you
and get it from you.

~~~
nunez
The language in the IP agreement I signed said the exact opposite. Engineers
from the group I was in left because of this. Can you elaborate?

~~~
DannyBee
"The language in the IP agreement I signed said the exact opposite."

Did you actually attend the week two training we give entitled "open source
and IP", that covers this in great detail?

"Engineers from the group I was in left because of this." I would love to know
who you believe left because of this. In the 11 years i've worked at Google,
the vast majority of people i've seen leave in this situation left because
they basically wanted to start a competitive startup, get the IP from google,
and still get paid by google at the same time (quite literally). The number of
people who left for ideological reasons i can count on one, maybe two hands.

------
ionised
> Further, Google apparently warns employees to not write about potentially
> illegal activities within the company, even to Google's own attorneys.

'Don't be evil' indeed.

------
coding123
This comes to mind..
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xH7eGFuSYI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xH7eGFuSYI)

------
maneesh
Didn't this happen to Hooli in the last season of Silicon Valley?

~~~
plandis
Life (maybe) mimics art!

------
someguydave
I'm truly shocked to read that an organization founded on grubbing as much
data as possible is also spying on its own workforce.

