Apple accused of snooping on workers’ iPhones in new lawsuit

An Apple employee is suing the company for allegedly requiring employees to waive their right to privacy and subjecting them to surveillance, as originally reported by Traffic lights. In lawsuit filed MondayApple employee Amar Bhakta accuses Apple of accessing employee data through company-managed devices — including personal iPhones that it “actively encourages” employees to use.

Although Apple gives employees the option to use an Apple-owned device for work, the lawsuit says Apple pushes users to bring their own iPhones to work, where they are managed by Apple’s internal software. Under company policy, data associated with these Apple-managed devices, including emails, photos, videos, notes and other information, is “subject to search by Apple,” according to the lawsuit. Bhakta claims that employees using their personal devices must link their personal iCloud accounts to the company as well, allowing Apple to collect an employee’s location data and other information while they are away from work.

Additionally, the suit alleges that Apple is violating California law by requiring employees to agree to a policy that allows it to “engage in physical, video and electronic surveillance of them,” as well as allowing it to search Apple and non-Apple Apple. devices on “company premises”, which in some cases could include an employee’s home office.

“For Apple employees, the Apple ecosystem is not a walled garden,” the lawsuit states. “It’s a prison yard. A panopticon where employees, both on- and off-duty, are always subject to Apple’s all-seeing eye.” Bhakta is also suing Apple over “illegal” back pay policies and claims the company is suppressing employee speech. The suit cites incidents in which Apple allegedly “banned” Bhakta from speaking publicly about his experience in digital advertising and forced him to remove information about his work at Apple from his LinkedIn profile. The National Labor Relations Board accused Apple of banning employees since the equal pay debate last month.

“At Apple, we’re focused on building the world’s best products and services, and we work to protect the inventions our teams create for customers,” Apple spokesman Josh Rosenstock said in a statement emailed to The Verge. “Every employee has the right to discuss their wages, hours and working conditions and this is part of our business conduct policy, which all employees are trained on annually. We strongly disagree with these allegations and believe they have no merit.”