Important Legal Tips
Legal Tip #1
The days of thinking an attorney can clean-up a social media mistake after-the-fact is over. Once you send a harmful message, it's in front of millions, and it becomes a permanent digital footprint. That's why courts demand that the sender (employees) receive training before you the hit the SEND key.
Legal Tip #2
To close hidden social media policy and training gaps, you must add the broadcast and publishing law perspective to your policy drafting and employee training. Although there are serious employment law consequences to social media, it's ultimately about broadcasting and publishing to a mass audience.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can't the in-house attorney update our social media policy?
The U.S. Supreme Court and federal courts classify social media as a specialized area of the law. Your policy drafter must be a social media law expert. You can't expect your in-house attorney to have the same expertise as a 33-year nationally recognized social media attorney specialist.
Do model social media policies hold up in court?
The biggest mistake is placing blind trust on a social media policy written by a reputable policy service or other organization. Unfortunately, most model policies are not written by a social media attorney specialist and fail in court for vagueness.
Shouldn't we just train our communication staff?
The answer is no. You have a new pool of employee broadcasters using personal devices for work without much oversight. An employee on social media can permanently destroy a person's reputation worldwide. Courts rule that it's negligence to avoid giving employees expert social media liability training.
Why train our employees if we pay for insurance?
This costly myth has caused the public and private sector big legal fees and a loss of public trust. Most courts rule social media harm cases as willful conduct, not accidental. Normally, insurance policies exclude willful conduct from coverage. You end up paying out of pocket for legal damages.