A couple of years ago, the US labor board accused Apple CEO Tim Cook of breaking federal law after the executive sent an all-staff email threatening to punish leakers. Now, it has dropped the charges. Here are the details.
A bit of background
In late January 2023, Bloomberg reported that the US National Labor Relations Board had determined that Apple’s “various work rules” were at odds with labor rights, and the complaint was forwarded to administrative law judges.
From the original report:
“The dispute was brought to the agency by former employee Ashley Gjovik, who filed claims in 2021 alleging that an email Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook sent pledging to punish leakers, as well as a set of policies in Apple’s employee handbook, violated federal law. Gjovik’s filings cited policies restricting staff from disclosing ‘business information,’ talking to reporters, revealing co-workers’ compensation or posting impolite tweets.”
The email, which Cook sent in 2021 following the leak of an internal meeting on sensitive topics such as pay equity and the Texas anti-abortion law, was uncharacteristically strong-worded.
In it, Cook said that “people who leak confidential information do not belong here,” and that Apple would do ”everything in our power to identify those who leaked” the information.
What happened today
As reported today by Bloomberg, the general counsel’s office of the NLRB withdrew multiple allegations, beyond the dismissal of the accusation against Cook:
“The agency’s prosecutors are also withdrawing allegations that Apple broke the law by imposing confidentiality rules, firing activist Janneke Parrish, and surveilling workers or making them think they were under surveillance. (…) In the letter Friday to the attorney representing Parrish, who had raised brought (sic) the allegations about the company’s actions and policies, a regional director said the agency had ‘carefully investigated and considered’ the claims and, ‘upon further consideration,’ determined many should be dismissed.”
In the report, Bloomberg also notes that this withdrawal follows an internal shake-up at the NLRB, which started when Trump replaced Biden-appointed Jennifer Abruzzo as the agency’s prosecutor.
In her place, he appointed William Cowen, who has been cutting back on the breadth and depth of investigated cases, despite still pursuing complaints against Amazon.com Inc., and Grindr Inc.
Do you think Apple’s anti-leak policies break the law? Let us know in the comments.
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