Protection of Employees Personal Information and Privacy

"This collection of essays – an outcome of the 12th Comparative Labour Law Seminar (Tokyo Seminar) hosted by the Japan Institute for Labour Policy and Training – presents detailed country reports on the status of employee privacy law in Australia, China, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, Spain, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The papers were presented by distinguished labour law scholars, and are reproduced here with some revisions to reflect the lively discussions that took place at the meeting. For each country, the topics examined include the following: default rules regarding employees’ personal information and privacy; regulatory schemes and available remedies against violation; what personal information an employer is entitled to obtain; ways of striking a balance between employers’ legitimate interests and employees' privacy; safeguards designed to secure non-coercive employee consent; drug and alcohol testing; surveillance of employees’ off-duty conduct; disclosure of a disciplined employee’s name or other work-related information; employee’s right to access personal information retained by the employer; information used to care for employees’ health and saf