It's one thing to make sure you and your spouse know how to get to your mutual financial or legal info, but would you share your e-mail passwords with your parter or spouse? A man hacked into his wife's email account to check up on the kind of messages she was sending and recieving and is now facing 5 yrs in jail for it. Do you think he should?

Quote :

Leon Walker has been charged under anti-hacking laws aimed at preventing identity theft in the US. The 33-year-old had suspected his wife Clara, who had been married twice before was having an affair with her former husband.

He is alleged to have used his computer skills to gain access to her Gmail email account on the shared home computer. Mr Walker discovered a series of emails which confirmed his suspicions that his wife was cheating on him.

With nearly half US divorce cases involving some form of privacy invasion such as the reading of text messages or social networking web pages, the case could have significant legal repercussions.

As her second husband had previously been arrested for beating her in front of her son, Walker handed the emails over to the boy's father.

The concerned father, Clara's first husband, sought sole custody of the boy and was forced into revealing Walker had leaked him the emails.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/8227235/Husband-facing-five-years-in-jail-after-hacking-wifes-email.html

That is a complex case with the second hubby having beaten her in front of the kid.

Though, I tend to lean toward texts, social networking being considered private, even in marriage. Financial records should be shared, but that is because the spouse may be in debt due to the spouse's business. I think that email and password protected sites should be separate from that, and considered private.

I wouldn't share my e-mail password with my spouse. There would be no need.

I wouldn't. Nobody knows the passwords to anything I have.

No I wouldn't....or I wouldn't feel obligated to, even if I did. Even married people need space and room to be. It's not about keeping secrets, it's more about room to have some sense of self and independence. I can have my own classified password for something as frivolous as an email account, I don't gotta share THAT with you.

My wife and I don't know each other's passwords and don't need to. They should leave Leon the fuck alone.

They're called my passwords because they're MY passwords, so no. If anyone is suspicious they can hire a private eye. But everyone is entitled to some degree of privacy & a life of their own.

Marc™ wrote:

No I wouldn't....or I wouldn't feel obligated to, even if I did. Even married people need space and room to be. It's not about keeping secrets, it's more about room to have some sense of self and independence. I can have my own classified password for something as frivolous as an email account, I don't gotta share THAT with you.

Absolutely! We have a "shared" email account which he never really uses, and assumes is "mine" even though any email I send from there come through with my husband's name on it, since he's the primary on the account.

I do, however, have a separate, unknown email all my own to talk privately with friends/family and not feel like the potential is there for being checked up on.

Absolutely not.

When I was married in the '90s the computer was relatively new and when I got it my wife did not use it. (When we separated she got the car I got the computer). So, my passwords were mine alone.

My sister and her husband have a shared account as do a couple of guys I know - have gotten e-mails from both on the one address. So, apparently some couples do share accounts.

I live alone but have all my passwords written down for various sites. If I were married I doubt that I would hide that list. Actually, my homepage is open on my home computer as I don't log off, so anyone can just click on all the sites. I doubt that I would change that if I had a partner. I don't hide stuff from significant others - they know the perv I am upfront.

Nope. It's not necessary. I mean it's no secret, and if she were perceptive she could probably figure it out because I tend to try and avoid using different passwords and such, but I wouldn't appreciate being asked for it.