Online Harassment in the Workplace: the Role of Technology in Labour Law Disputes Nelson Tenório 1,2 * & Pernille Bjørn 2,3 * 1 UniCesumar, Brazil & University of Copenhagen, Denmark, Av. Guedner, 1610, building 7, of fice 9, Maringá, Paraná , Brazil (E-mail: nelson@di.ku.dk; E-mail: nelson.tenorio@unicesumar.edu.br); 2 Department of Computer Science, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen , Denmark (E-mail: nelson@di.ku.dk; E-mail: nelson.tenorio@unicesumar.edu.br); 3 HCDE Department, University of Washington, Seattle, WA , USA Abstract. In this paper, we explore the role technology plays in online workplace harassment as it emerges in the legal verdicts of labour law courts. Analysing 106 of ficial legal verdicts on labour law violations, we demonstrate how technological traces are used as evidence for both indictment and the defence. We find that chat technologies risk providing a platform for online workplace harassment which extends beyond the boundaries of work and into private life. In contrast to online harassment on social media sites, online harassment in the workplace exists within situations of known audiences in hierarchical organisational structures. Thus, speaking up against a violator can have severe financial and social consequences for the survivor. Our data show that chat technology, by capturing and documenting abusive behaviours, makes harassment visible, allowing survivors to hold the harassers legally account- able. Furthermore, we find that online harassment, because it extends beyond the physical workplace, extends the legal and ethical responsibility of the employer. We argue that research on computer- supported co-operative work should consider how the design of co-operative technologies can help survivors speak up, as well as inhibit violators’ abusive behaviour. We also propose that design strategies must consider employers’ extended responsibility for moral and ethical conduct. Keywords: Abusive behaviour, Labour laws, Chat technology, Legal disputes, Workplace harassment, Online harassment, Skype, WhatsApp, Moral harassment, Sexual harassment, Legal evidence 1. Introduction Research on computer-supported co-operative work (CSCW) aims to understand the essential nature of co-operative work in order to design co-operative technologies (Schmidt and Bannon 1992). By exploring unanticipated use of co-operative technol- ogies, we gain important insights into the consequences of our designs. Thus, in this paper, we are particularly interested in the unanticipated use and unintended conse- quences of one specific type of technology in the workplace: chat technology. Chat technology is increasingly entering the workplace as companies use applications such as SLACK, WHATSAPP, SKYPE, or VIBER for coordination, software testing, or other types of work (Tenório et al. 2018; Pinto et al. 2017; Handel and Herbsleb 2002). How companies and employees use technology shapes work in important ways, and it Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) DOI 10.1007/s10606-019-09351-2 © Springer Nature B.V. 2019