Should site owners be able to view messages in certain circumstances?

[Grant]

Should there ever be a time where a site owner is allowed to view private messages on their own site? I think a site owner should never be able to view messages, unless they are running a service which relies on all parties to work together. So if it's a site like ebay for example, I think there should be a way for ebay staff to view private messages between users in case there is possible theft or scamming being done.

But what if it's a forum? Would you think it's acceptable to be able to view a PM between two users? Maybe they're starting stuff against each other on the forum and you have to investigate the issue to make a decision. Should you have access to their messages? Or require they share them instead?

 

[Kane]

The messaging system is widely abused in the forums. A lot of people use this to spam, or even scam. Some people even go further and use private messages on forums to make personal attacks.Therefore, I believe site owners should be able to see private mesages.

 

[Heatman]

Well, this is something that's been going on with forums. Board owners have access to read private message of members on their forum. This privilege isn't something the forum owners abuse it's for security reasons to protect other members on the forum. I'm all in support of this feature and it should be used on all platforms as long as the owner doesn't abuse the feature.

 

[Ja sa bong]

Forums owners have the need to read conversation of everyone in the forum. There are members who abuse using the DM feature in disgusting manner. I've seen a member who goes on begging everyone in the forum for money in their DM.

 

[Frank]

The messaging system is widely abused in the forums. A lot of people use this to spam, or even scam. Some people even go further and use private messages on forums to make personal attacks.Therefore, I believe site owners should be able to see private mesages.

This is true. There are a lot of times where, if the site owner, can't be able to view messages, a lot of things will go wrong. So, being able to see some messages will help them take drastic moves before things get worse on the forum. This is also very important when the forum is very active.

 

[Kane]

I also believe admin should avoid sneak peaking into the users message boxes. This will be against personal privacy and freedom. However, when someone reports the messages for spam or other reasons, admin should check the messages and take appropriate actions.