US
computer company Hewlett Packard has sacked two members of its UK staff and
suspended a further 150 for e-mail abuse.
BBC
Online reports that two employees in the company’s Scotland office were
dismissed, and staff have been suspended elsewhere in the UK and Ireland.
A
statement from the company said: "HP can confirm that this involves the
viewing and sharing of unauthorised and inappropriate material."
It
is understood that the suspended staff are made up of 60 permanent staff and 90
contract staff.
The
numbers involved suggests that this is one of the biggest cases of its kind so
far.
The
fate of the suspended staff will be determined following a company
investigation. Hewlett Packard employs about 7,000 people in the UK.
The
news follows last week’s revelation that one quarter of companies have sacked
staff for Internet abuse and that 70 per cent of those dismissals were pornography-related.
The survey – conducted by Personnel Today and Internet filtering company Websense
– is available here.
