AIBU to think writing confidential HR notes on a train is inappropriate?

[Elphabababa]

I am on a train in the UK.

Someone on the seat in front of me is writing up meeting notes from work. All clearly visible through the gaps between seats. I am slightly long sighted mind you.

I have seen that:

• She works in HR for company X
• The meeting was for an employee named Y (I can see his name and job title), following him raising a grievance about a GDPR breach of his data within work.
• Subsequent notes of the meeting about this grievance.

She's still typing her notes now.

AIBU for thinking that people should be very mindful of what work they complete in public places? And that this is inappropriate, and if Y found out that these notes were being written in full public view, they would have a further grievance on their hands?

Or am I a nosey parker?

(Or both?)

go on report her
she should not be doing work like this in a public place

Clearly she is unaware and needs a privacy screen for her laptop, but why are you looking and running to MN? Pretty sure every time I work on a train, it's because I have to not want to. She would probably much rather have the laptop in the bag and be staring out of the window listening to a podcast or music. Yet here you are inviting strangers to judge, and considering contacting her employer with such glee 🙄

One of the reason people do it is because increasingly companies are asking too much of employees. People are working more than 8 hours each day, any moment they can grab they try to deal with some work related stuff. Three wrongs dont make a right: Wrong 1: Why is op snooping through seats and reading someone's writing. Inappropriate. Wrong 2: Person on train (least of my worrries in some respect. Wrong 3: Company not employing enough people or supporting them enough to do work in work hours only.
Now I know some here are lucky enough not to be overworked. They close laptop at work at 4 or 5 and never think of work again till next working day at the appropriate time in the office or at home in privacy. Many of us do not have this previlege. And before someone says quit or find a better job, its not always that easy.

I’d report! It won’t be just this one but probably every day

I'm honestly shocked by the amount of people who think this is ok and wonder if they'd be happy if the personal info was theirs or their family's? If you have to work in a public place, at least choose something to do that isn't so sensitive or with identifiable personal information.

So then if you have had proper GDPR training you would know the op has absolutely no obligation to tap the HR woman on the shoulder and address this with her. I think what you have been told in your “training” is that a situation may arise in the work place where you witness a potential data / confidentiality breach. Let’s say one colleague saw another colleague potentially breaching GDPR and they had a word with that colleague who was breaching the GDPR. That’s fine to address it with that colleague. However, it is also the other colleague’s responsibility to report it to the necessary person.
You cannot apply the same logic about a member of the general public addressing the situation to the HR woman - the op was a member of the general public who happened to be on the same train journey. She is not a colleague of the HR woman and had no obligation to tap her on the shoulder address it with her.
Yes it would have been a good thing for the op to make the HR woman aware, but op has no obligation to do that whatsoever. So for you to keep putting the responsibility back on the op and saying she should have addressed it with the HR woman is just ridiculous. The op is not responsible for an employee of a company she does not work for.
The responsibility lies with the HR woman to keep the information private.

Companies might ask too much, etc, but she was in a public place. There are nosy people around, and there are some who will have bad intentions, or at the least, will be prepared to make use of the information they see or hear. You do not know who the people around you are and whether they are good or bad. They knew this in WW2 and had posters up to warn people not to talk about things on trains and in public. And on a train, especially commuter trains, there's a higher chance of there being people who know you or the client or the business. Things like this should not be worked on in public, however pressed for time you are.

Agree . If I work in a public place /train it will be on things that don't involve any personal or confidential information. So things like reading journal articles or reviewing publicly available information

People are incredibly naive I think.

But you shouldn't be working on anything that contains personal data or is confidential no matter how much you "have to".

Agree. I often wonder why a lot of people get their laptops out on trains and do their “work” while commuting to work 🤔 Just wait until you get to the office to do it….or do light work that doesn’t involve having someone’s personal details on show.

Being overworked and underpaid is no excuse for doing confidential work in a public place.
I'm pretty sure if the person named on that document found out that a stranger had been able to read it he'd have a very, very good case for a(nother!) GDPR breach.

Exactly

• do an online course (maybe on GDPR )
• read a journal or do some research
• review public policy documents or any other publicly available information (a thorough read of the ICO's website might be a good place to start )

The irony! This is a sackable offence where I work. Call and report this- they’d do it if it were you.

I didn't say it was right, I said it was understandable and mostly driven by modern work culture. Yes, she made a mistake, but the level of report her, on this thread, instead of maybe tap her on the shoulder and remind her that you can see it is pretty unpleasant.

Again, it is not the op’s responsibility to tap the HR woman on the shoulder and address it. The op can report it to the company if she likes and the company should be the ones to deal with it… not some member of the general public who happened to be on the same train journey. The op is not there to police employees of companies she doesn’t work for.

Yes, that's all well and good general advice. However, the law is a tad more specific, the duty in this instance sits with the controller, the employer. So, unless you are familiar with their data security policies and protections in place, for this it should explicitly state that she can't work on a train, or should supply the privacy tools if not, then they are the ones at fault. You can't judge her unless you know the controls in place. The ICO are not really interested in her personal disclosure, they are interested in the employers interpretation and compliance of A4.

Can't believe the OP is getting the blame on the first page at least. I'd be tempted to send a photo to the person involved in support of their case!

Completely wrong. I remember sitting on a train and being appalled as I watched someone marking formal exam papers opposite me.

If I was the person being written about in public, I'd want to know, particularly if I already had a grievance in the same vein! I know I can't do my work in public, so I don't.

I agree, the OP is there to travel between A and B. But, in this instance she's involved herself, and has a choice as to her actions, she chose MN 🤷‍♀️

Yes she chose MN for advice. I agree with pp’s that if she feels so strongly about it then she should report it directly to the company rather than addressing it with the employee herself.

Do people with children deserve additional leniency for wrongdoing?

and there is a chance she might have left the paper work on the train, it happens
there are rules surely

@Pineapplewhip , The people on here telling you to report her are complete Karen's who take complete joy in knowing they might get someone fired.
what's with the 'complete Karen's' other than showing you to be an ageist bigot with poor grammar?

No consideration for the fact this is a human being, who might have a handful of kids at home
What's that got to do with her competence or lack of it?
Would you think it was OK for your GP to be slapdash because he or she had a handful of children?

and be reliant on this job to keep her head above water.
A job in which she fails to follow regulations

Its not a good economy - she could be out of work for months if she was sacked.
Tough shit. The organization could hire someone competent.

I agree. Thinking how I’d feel if it was my personal info and info on a grievance being out there for anyone to see.