How much privacy do spouse have from each other?

[luvmy3]

In theory, I suppose if you want a private email account that is your right...and it's the right of your spouse to wonder why?

My wife and I have most everything joint, with the exception of a credit card or two.

We each have our own emails / facebook pages and the like but know the others pw's. We dont necessarily go into each other's accounts but we do know how to if we were so inclined.

IMO....to be hung up on having a "PRIVATE" email and not letting your spouse know the password for it, is setting you up to be questioned by the other spouse as to exactly what you're doing in there that you dont want them to know about.

My dh and I have private emails, always have. We do not know eachother's passwords because we have never asked. I trust my dh, and he trusts me enough to not have to know eachother's password. We aren't hiding anything from eachother we just respect the fact that although we may be married we do deserve some privacy, and those people emailing us deserve privacy as well.

As far as anything like financial, medical, etc info, they are already shared accts and we each know the passwords. Those things are different from email.

 

[Pakey]

We have private emails also. I'm not the least bit interested in snooping and neither is he. I would not give him access if he asked. There is nothing to hide but I don't particularly want him listening in on every conversation I have with my friends, whether it be in person, on the phone, or via the written word. And I certainly don't want to listen to his; I hear enough about golf as it is.

He can have all the passwords to the banking, credit cards, etc that I do online; that is not a problem. There are no secrets when it comes to the money. My personal email is like my handbag or his wallet; keep your mitts off!!!

 

[AristocatFan]

DH and I share everything. We share a personal email account and each have our own work accounts but know each others passwords. He's too busy to even look at his personal emails so I have to relay everything! Keeping secrets in a marriage just causes problems. If a spouse feels the need to start looking for info then there's already a problem in the marriage!

 

[ccgirl]

I think there is a difference between keeping secrets and just expecting privacy. My DH and myself each have our own passwords to things, ATM's, email accts etc. It is up to us to share these things. I have been writing an email and had him look over my shoulder. I kindly asked him to give me some privacy. The email had nothing to do with him but, quite frankly, it was none of his business. We do not keep secrets from each other but he is not my child and deserves privacy, as do I.

 

[englishteacha]

A friend kept a private email account, forgot to log out on his private computer, and his wife decided to look. He'd been cheating. He stayed in his marriage mainly because he'd lose everything because his wife had proof he cheated. Not that cheating is right, but if it's illegal to look in a spouse's email, then did she really have "proof" or was it like an illegal search? Just being devil's advocate.

 

[ccgirl]

A friend kept a private email account, forgot to log out on his private computer, and his wife decided to look. He'd been cheating. He stayed in his marriage mainly because he'd lose everything because his wife had proof he cheated. Not that cheating is right, but if it's illegal to look in a spouse's email, then did she really have "proof" or was it like an illegal search? Just being devil's advocate.

It is illegal to look in anyones email unless it is authorized. Spouse or not. Why people think they have a right to look in their spouses email is just beyond me. Would you look at your co-workers? The way I see it is a spouse is not a possession. You do not have a right to their personal accounts. What if a spouse intentionally opened a letter that was addressed to the other? Without authorization, this would be mail fraud.

 

[RitaE]

I wouldn't look at my co-workers emails because I'm not married to my co-workers and I haven't pledged to share my life with them.

Would I open my spouse's mail? Around here whomever makes the trip to the mailbox opens the mail.

 

[wvjules]

Just because a person doen't want a spouse looking through their email doesn't mean they have something to hide.

I have nothing secretive in my purse but it drives me insane when DD or DBF gets in there to find something like gum or toothpicks. That is my space. I see my (and his) email the same way.

 

[bicker]

Why people think they have a right to look in their spouses email is just beyond me. Would you look at your co-workers? The way I see it is a spouse is not a possession.

Without commenting (in this message) on whether there is or should be any such rights, the way you're expressing it here is a very one-sided way of looking at it, almost as if you only see marriage such that it has a master and a servant. Marriage is a partnership, and therefore the "right" you speak of would be bidirectional, i.e., each of the two people would have the same rights as the other.

Again without commenting (in this message) on whether there is or should be any such rights, the real issue is whether a married couple is or is not (or should be, if not already) a single legal entity. As a single legal entity, what is directed at one is (would be), by definition, directed at both. Why is this important? A personal lawsuit directed at a husband seeks damages that may be sought from the resources of the wife. That one example, alone, is sufficient to demonstrate how sticky this situation could get. Is it fair for a wife to have no means of knowing that her assets are about to be attached, until it is practically too late to do that much about it? I'm not sure.

 

[lakelandgal70]

I don't have my email password protected but even if I did hubby would know password. We both know all the passwords to all the things that are password protected. However I don't go looking at his emails nor does he look at mine.

 

[brerrabbit]

Well maybe it's because I can say I am from a different generation or because I have been married for almost 29 years to the same woman but we have no trust issues at all. She knows my e-mail password and I know hers. We have all the passwords for bills written down so either of us can pay bills. It is not an issue at all. We both have computers and we both use each others all the time. I think it comes down to a personal issue vs what the law says about it. I understand the need for security and privacy and the laws to protect that, but those lines start blurring when a marraige is involved.

On a side note, I find it so interesting in today's world that people get all bent out of shape and think people are stalking them or something when those same people are willing to put their entire lives out there for the world to see. Example: I have friends on Facebook who tell me what they are doing almost 24 hours a day. Then when I ask them something about how was this or that, they get suspisious and ask me how did I know what they were doing. I have to point out to them that they posted it on Facebook and then suddenly it's like, oh yea I did didn't I.

Another example, a lady who is a realator in my area, that lives in my neighborhood and has kids 7 to 8 years younger than mine. She has adds in the local paper with her picture, her picture on her signs, picture on adds on the shopping carts in the grocery store, a facebook page, a web site and god knows how many mailers she has sent us saying she is a resident of our neighborhood. So one day at the baseball field a mutual friend introduced us and I said oh yeah your Mary Jones (example) and you live in Oak Brook Estates, nice to meet you. We stand there talking for a few minutes and I obviously said a couple more things that bothered her because she thought I knew to much about her. She then asks " are you stalking me or something?" I then had to explain to her, look Lady, your face is plastered all over town, I get a piece of mail with your name and picture on it in my mail about once a week, have looked at your web site which gives way to much personal data about you, and you live across the street from a very good friend of mine whose house I am at all the time. I have no desire to stalk you, and no need to. You pretty much tell the world everything they need to know to find you anytime of the day or night.

The point of my whole post is this, the same people who will scream about privacy are the same ones in our new world that will freely tell you via twitter, Facebook, or any other way every detail of their lives.

 

[SaraJayne]

DH and I share an email account, so privacy isn't an issue with that. I do have another email account that I only use for online forums. It's been looked at a few times in the last few years. lol

DH doesn't have my FB password and he doesn't need to know it. I discuss personal issues with friends that are none of his business. My right to privacy didn't end when I said "I do".

As far as mail goes, whoever gets the mail opens it. Doesn't matter who it's addressed to.

With all that said, if DH and I were in the middle of divorce proceedings, that's a whole other issue. I think the DH in the news story was wrong to snoop in his wife's email, but do I think he should be put in jail for five years? No.

 

[PaulaSB12]

I read this story, the man was the wife's third husband. She had a child with him and a child from the first marriage. Her second husband (the man she was cheating with) had been violent to her in front of her son. He found out that she was taking both children to stay with this violent man and told the first husband. Both father's then went and got custody of their children. I think it has more to do with the fact that the mother lost custody of the children rather than hacking how is it hacking when she left the password in plain sight?

 

[luvmy3]

I wouldn't look at my co-workers emails because I'm not married to my co-workers and I haven't pledged to share my life with them.

Would I open my spouse's mail? Around here whomever makes the trip to the mailbox opens the mail.

I guess its all how you see things in your marriage. When I married dh, I pledged to love, honor, take care of, respect him, raise a family with him, thats how we share our life.

 

[RitaE]

Well to be honest, I really can't remember the last time I even looked at my DHs email accounts but I am on his computer all the time. I really am not that interested in his conversations with his old college friends and his cousins etc.

And yeah, if I started running into a bunch of password protected crap that didn't have to do with his work - I think it would give me an uncomfortable feeling of wanting to know what was going on behind those passwords that had to be hidden from my eyes.

As for my computer - I have a program that stores all my site passwords and he knows how to use that. I showed it to him because I manage all the financial sites and if I were to die an unexpected death he'd need to figure out how to get to the money.

So I think in our case we both do have Privacy in that I don't go deliberately pawing through his stuff and he doesn't as far as I know go through mine. But it isn't privacy that is established by a lock and key, just through our way of doing things.

And I'd never in a million years compare my marriage to my relationship with my co-workers.

 

[hulagirl87]

DH and I have separate computers. I have a laptop and he has, well, the regular kind DH is a computer nerd. He builds computers, knows them inside and out, and I'm sure if he wanted to hack into my email, he could at any moment, but he doesn't because one, I don't have anything to hide, and two, why would he? I would never think of going into his email either. Plus, you don't need a password to check email. Well, the way that ours is. we have outlook, so if your computer is just on your wallpaper/desktop you just press the icon and email pops up. no way to hide anything there

 

[bicker]

Well maybe it's because I can say I am from a different generation or because I have been married for almost 29 years to the same woman but we have no trust issues at all.

I doubt that it is a generation-specific issue. You're probably in the same generation as my wife and I, but my parents, from the generation prior to ours, had substantial "trust issues", even after 20 years of marriage. I'm sure many of us can also point toward couples in our own generation, as well as in the younger generation, who suffered from "trust issues".

On a side note, I find it so interesting in today's world that people get all bent out of shape and think people are stalking them or something when those same people are willing to put their entire lives out there for the world to see.

Well, I don't think that's true. On Facebook and other such services, people have control over what they share, both in terms of what they put into the service in the first place, and in terms of security they apply to restrict who can view that information, if they choose to assert that control. So it isn't really a matter of sharing information or not; it's a matter of the person who's information it is having the ability to choose.

Example: I have friends on Facebook who tell me what they are doing almost 24 hours a day. Then when I ask them something about how was this or that, they get suspisious and ask me how did I know what they were doing. I have to point out to them that they posted it on Facebook and then suddenly it's like, oh yea I did didn't I.

I cannot account for that inconsistency... I just don't think it leads to the conclusion you asserted that it did.

The point of my whole post is this, the same people who will scream about privacy are the same ones in our new world that will freely tell you via twitter, Facebook, or any other way every detail of their lives.

First: Not every person will be in both columns of your list. Second, practically no one actually provides you "every" detail - in each case they provide you the details that they choose to provide, which may or may not be more than is advisable, but isn't absolute, as you assert it to be.

 

[Arielle22]

I think privacy in a marriage is something that should be negotiated by the couple not the law. As evidenced by this thread people have different comfort levels and that should be taken into consideration.

I have been married 25 years. DH and I would not care if the other looked at their email or Facebook. Sometimes we go in to retrieve an email the other got but we mention to the other what was done (as in honey I got the Verizon email from your account today).

On occasion I have gone into his wallet and he into my pocketbook. Again we mention it. Usually he has cash so if I need it (say for our daughters school) I take it and tell him. He really does not like going into my pocketbook, for some reason he thinks it is mysterious.

DH and I have the same group of friends (mostly my siblings and spouses) so there are no great secrets with us.

The only time we ever gets secretive is at our birthdays, anniversary or Christmas. If we are getting emails about a present or a package delivered, we will tell the other not to open email or the package.

As for mail, if I didn't open it it would not get opened. The only things I don't open are the mail for my MIL. She is in a nursing home and DH handles her finances. So those 2 bills a month he opens and the rest is for me to open or trash.

 

[sbell111]

I read this story, the man was the wife's third husband. She had a child with him and a child from the first marriage. Her second husband (the man she was cheating with) had been violent to her in front of her son. He found out that she was taking both children to stay with this violent man and told the first husband. Both father's then went and got custody of their children. I think it has more to do with the fact that the mother lost custody of the children rather than hacking

While that establishes motive for the husband to break the law, it is not a legal defense against the charges.

how is it hacking when she left the password in plain sight?

A few years ago, a college student illegally accessed Sarah Palin's yahoo email account. He simply used publicly available information to answer her security questions. Just because the information needed to access her account was easily obtained doesn't mean that he was right to use it to get into her email account.

 

[luvmy3]

Well to be honest, I really can't remember the last time I even looked at my DHs email accounts but I am on his computer all the time. I really am not that interested in his conversations with his old college friends and his cousins etc.

And yeah, if I started running into a bunch of password protected crap that didn't have to do with his work - I think it would give me an uncomfortable feeling of wanting to know what was going on behind those passwords that had to be hidden from my eyes.

As for my computer - I have a program that stores all my site passwords and he knows how to use that. I showed it to him because I manage all the financial sites and if I were to die an unexpected death he'd need to figure out how to get to the money.

So I think in our case we both do have Privacy in that I don't go deliberately pawing through his stuff and he doesn't as far as I know go through mine. But it isn't privacy that is established by a lock and key, just through our way of doing things.

And I'd never in a million years compare my marriage to my relationship with my co-workers.

And for those of us who don't share passwords its the same. Dh and I don't keep our email under lock and key because we want privacy, we keep it under lock and key because neither of us have feel we need to have access to eachothers personal email acct. Its a mutual, non spoken respect we have for eachothers privacy, that extends to snail mail, cell phone voicemail, anything that is ours as individuals. Thats our way of doing things, and it has notihng to do with us hiding things from eachother, or keeping secrets.
I think people (in general) who feel that keeping your email password private means you are hiding things, or keeping secrets from your spouse, have trust issues. Since dh and I trust eachother completely, keeping a password private just isn't an issue for us.