An American airline will have to answer charges that it illegally gained access to one of its own pilot's Web sites which criticised its management, a Federal appeals court has ruled.

Bloomberg reports a decision by the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse an earlier decision to dismiss a pilot's lawsuit, which claimed that Hawaiian Airlines had broken federal wiretap and employment laws in accessing his secure site under false pretences. The court heard that a company VP logged onto the site 20 times using another pilot's name.

The decision sets a precedent that means unauthorised access to private Web site may be in violation of both federal Wiretap or Stored Communication Acts.

"The contents of secure Web sites are 'electronic communications' in intermediate storage that are protected from unauthorised interception under the Wiretap Act," the court stated in its ruling.

The case has being returned to a federal judge pending further proceedings. ®

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