Confidentiality contract breaches confidentiality? Thread poster: John Rawlins
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John Rawlins 
Spain
Local time: 01:14
Spanish to English
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A Spanish agency I used to work with has just sent me a confidentiality agreement and asked me to return a signed copy.
What attracted my attention was that the agency has sent the contract to all of its 30+ translators as a 'copy to' email. That is to say, all of their translators have been given a list of all of the translators working for the agency - together with their email addresses.
Of course, this is a silly thing to do. But is it a breach of confidentiality in itself?
[Edited at 2010-10-21 18:19 GMT]
| | | | | Extremely Unprofessional! | Oct 21, 2010 |
John Rawlins wrote:
A Spanish agency I used to work with has just sent me a confidentiality agreement and asked me to return a signed copy.
What attracted my attention was that the agency has sent the contract to all of its 30+ translators as a 'copy to' email. That is to say, all of their translators have been given a list of all of the translators working for the agency - together with their email addresses.
Of course, this is a silly thing to do. But is it a breach of confidentiality in itself?
[Edited at 2010-10-21 18:19 GMT]
Hi John,
You're absolutely right! this is a highly unprofessional behaviour from that translation agency and it does breach confidentiality. Besides, the common proverb says "don't put all your eggs in one basket", but unfortunately this is exactly what that agency did.
Regards,
[Edited at 2010-10-21 20:30 GMT]
[Edited at 2010-10-21 20:46 GMT]
| | | | LEXpert
United States
Local time: 18:14
Member (2008)
Croatian to English
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| Probably not according to your NDA | Oct 21, 2010 |
If it's like most, the agreement only spells out your obligations of confidentiality, not the agency's. So I doubt there's any provision in the NDA that the agency could actually breach. After all, their lawyers wrote it.
Of course, if you just meant to point out the irony of the situation, I can certainly see that.
| | | | | Unprofessional and Unpolite | Oct 21, 2010 |
Yes, I agree with the "unprofessional" point of view. This must not happen in any company. Period.
Last week a company also approached a huge list of En>pt-BR translators in an e-mail offering a job at a very low rate (and "almost 60-days-payment-term"), with all the e-mail address of all of us in the list placed on the "open" address list of the e-mail. Many colleagues replied to the company pointing that, besides the extremely low fare, that open list of To-addresses was very unpolite.
To me, it was at least sheer lack of skill in using e-mail system (even after 20 years the system is around); then, on a second level, it may be an unpolite behavior; but, to a higher level of mischievousness, it may be a tentative act to intimidate the professionals so as to make the broadest group of people think that the rates are consistently low and must be accepted. It did not make me to. And should not make anyone else.
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madak
United Kingdom
Local time: 00:14
Swedish to English
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| Data protection legislation is more relevant | Oct 21, 2010 |
Rudolf Vedo CT wrote:
Probably not according to your NDA
But probably breaching the data protection laws applicable in their country. Particularly as the agency in based in the EU which has pretty restrictive legislation when it comes to mass mailing (though not as restrictive as the US).
| | | | | Proz Professional guidelines for translation service providers | Oct 21, 2010 |
Madeleine MacRae Klintebo wrote: Rudolf Vedo CT wrote:
Probably not according to your NDA
But probably breaching the data protection laws applicable in their country. Particularly as the agency in based in the EU which has pretty restrictive legislation when it comes to mass mailing (though not as restrictive as the US).
This act also constitutes a violation of Proz Professional guidelines for translation service providers. The guidelines for Professional translators and translation companies invites both parties to "treat all sensitive information as confidential, and take steps to protect that confidentiality", and this call for respecting confidentiality applies to both parties of the transaction. This point should be made clear.
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