An employee at a New Zealand Subway restaurant has reportedly been suspended after allegedly sexually harassing a woman online after she shared her personal information as part of a coronavirus contact tracing effort.
An Auckland woman identified only as “Jess” said she was “creeped out” when she was repeatedly contacted by a male worker after she shared her details at a location of the sandwich chain for contact tracing purposes, according to Newshub.
“I felt pretty gross, he made me feel really uncomfortable… he’s contacting me, I didn’t ask him to do that, I don’t want that,” Jess told the outlet. “I had to put my details on their contact tracing form which I didn’t think anything of. It asked for my name, home address, email address and phone number so I put all those details down.”
The unnamed employee is said to have contacted the woman by sending texts and social media requests on platforms including Facebook and Instagram after she left the restaurant. Jess said the incident made her thankful she does not live alone and hoped that changes would be made so others are not also harassed after sharing details.
“Even now I feel a bit creeped out and vulnerable,” she said. “You just want to know that that information is protected and it’s not going to be misused for some dude to just text you because he fancies you, that’s not the point of the information.”
In the wake of the incident, Subway suspended the employee pending an investigation and has adopted a new digital contact tracing system that ensures details are kept private unless requested by government officials for contact tracing purposes.
Sharing details with restaurants for contact tracing purposes has been common in New Zealand as the country gradually reopens. The country has enforced a number of strict preventative measures since the pandemic began. Comprehensive lockdown orders resulted in the elimination of community spread of the virus, according to the medical journal The Lancet.
New Zealand has experienced far fewer COVID-19 cases than most countries, with the country of just under 5 million seeing fewer than 1,500 cases and only 21 deaths. Only two people remain hospitalized, with over 1,400 having recovered.
The country added no additional cases on Wednesday and schools, offices and a number of businesses were set to reopen on Thursday. Borders remain closed to international travel.
Newsweek reached out to Subway New Zealand and New Zealand’s Ministry of Health for comments. This article will be updated with any responses.
