A ruling (Supreme Court judgment from 3 April 2019, II PK 334/17) emphasised that transferring an employer’s documents from their server to an employee’s private email account constitutes a violation of basic employee duties. This gives the employer grounds to terminate the employment contract without notice, due to the employee’s fault (Article 52 of the Labour Code).

It does not matter whether the employee actually uses the information. The mere unauthorised transfer of data to a private email account is a breach of the duty to protect the employer’s interests (Article 100 § 2 point 4 of the Labour Code).

Such an action also constitutes unfair competition under the Act on Combatting Unfair Competition of 16 April 1993, and gives the employer the right to seek compensation.