&gt; <i>If you allow your employees to use certain means of communication for private messages, you bar yourself from reading them. If you prohibit private messages on that channel though, you have to enforce that.</i><p>Just curious, are you in the US? My employer&#x27;s policy is essentially &quot;Your work-provided laptop is for work. However, we recognize that you&#x27;ll access personal websites and content from time to time. Don&#x27;t miss deadlines because you&#x27;re on Facebook or the NY Times all day.&quot; However, they explicitly retain their right (but not responsibility!) to monitor, log, and retain all traffic and activity on not only the work machines, but the work wifi (including guest wifi).<p>I asked about the US because I know privacy protections are much strong in the EU and I had never heard that allowing private messages bars an employer from reading them.