National Labor Relations Board Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon reports on the outcome of investigations into 14 cases involving the use of social media and employers’ social and general media policies, in the hope “that this report will be of assistance to practitioners and human resource professionals.”

In four cases involving employees’ use of Facebook, it was found that the employees were engaged in “protected concerted activity” because they were discussing terms and conditions of employment with fellow employees. In five other cases involving Facebook or Twitter posts it found that the activity was not protected, according to the report.

In one case, it was determined that a union engaged in unlawful coercive conduct when it videotaped interviews with employees at a nonunion jobsite about their immigration status and posted an edited version on YouTube and the Local Union’s Facebook page.

In five cases, some provisions of employers’ social media policies were found to be unlawfully overly-broad. A final case involved an employer’s lawful policy restricting its employees’ contact with the media.