Quick answer: No.
Reason: “Marital right of privacy” as explained by the Supreme Court in the case of “Cecilia Zulueta versus Court of Appeals and Alfredo Martin” (G.R. No. 107383, February 20, 1996).
Notice that the Zulueta case was decided way back in 1996 when very few Filipinos knew about the Internet. The World Wide Web had just been invented (in 1989) by Tim Berners-Lee; there was only Mosaic, the predecessor of our present-day browsers. But the Supreme Court’s ruling on the “marital right of privacy” still applies today.
Facts of the case:
Cecilia is married to Alfredo, a medical doctor. Thinking that Alfredo is involved in extramarital affairs, Cecilia entered his clinic on March 26, 1982. In the presence of her mother, a driver, and Alfredo’s secretary, she forcibly opened the drawers and cabinet in the clinic and took 157 documents consisting of private correspondence between Alfredo and his alleged paramours, greetings cards, canceled checks, diaries, Alfredo's passport, and photographs.
Cecilia wanted to use the documents and papers in two cases that she had filed against Alfredo: (1) legal separation; and (2) disqualification from the practice of medicine.
Alfredo files case against Cecilia with the Regional Trial Court of Manila
Alfredo asked the RTC to order Cecilia to return all the seized documents and papers. The RTC ruled in Alfredo’s favor, ordering Cecilia to return the documents and papers and to pay damages. It also prohibited Cecilia and her lawyer from using the documents and papers as evidence in the cases that she had filed against Alfredo.
(Alfredo later filed a disbarment case against Cecilia’s lawyer when he used the documents and papers in the case for Alfredo’s disqualification from the practice of medicine.)
Cecilia brought her case up to the Court of Appeals, but the court also ruled against her.
Supreme Court ruling on “marital right of privacy”
The Court ruled against Cecilia, saying that:
Indeed the documents and papers in question are inadmissible in evidence. The constitutional injunction declaring “the privacy of communication and correspondence [to be] inviolable” is no less applicable simply because it is the wife (who thinks herself aggrieved by her husband’s infidelity) who is the party against whom the constitutional provision is to be enforced. The only exception to the prohibition in the Constitution is if there is a “lawful order [from a court or when public safety or order requires otherwise, as prescribed by law.”Any violation of this provision renders the evidence obtained inadmissible "for any purpose in any proceeding."
The intimacies between husband and wife do not justify any one of them in breaking the drawers and cabinets of the other and in ransacking them for any telltale evidence of marital infidelity. A person, by contracting marriage, does not shed his/her integrity or his right to privacy as an individual and the constitutional protection is ever available to him or to her. [boldfacing supplied]
The law insures absolute freedom of communication between the spouses by making it privileged. Neither husband nor wife may testify for or against the other without the consent of the affected spouse while the marriage subsists. Neither may be examined without the consent of the other as to any communication received in confidence by one from the other during the marriage, save for specified exceptions. But one thing is freedom of communication; quite another is a compulsion for each one to share what one knows with the other. And this has nothing to do with the duty of fidelity that each owes to the other.
Related issues:
1. The Supreme Court’s ruling mentions “the duty of fidelity that each [spouse] owes to the other.” This refers to Article 68 of the Family Code which states: “The husband and wife are obliged to live together, observe mutual love, respect and fidelity, and render mutual help and support.”
(The Family Code mentions “love” only twice: Article 68 and Article 220.)
2. If your spouse has opened and read, without your consent, your physical letters or your social media accounts, can you file a case against him or her under Article 290 of the Revised Penal Code?
Answer: No.
Reason: Marital exemption
The Revised Penal Code states:
Art. 290. Discovering secrets through seizure of correspondence. The penalty of prision correccional in its minimum and medium periods and a fine not exceeding P500 shall be imposed upon any private individual who in order to discover the secrets of another, shall seize his papers or letters and reveal the contents thereof.
If the offender shall not reveal such secrets, the penalty shall be arresto mayor and a fine not exceeding P500.
The provision shall not be applicable to parents, guardians, or persons entrusted with the custody of minors with respect to the papers or letters of the children or minors placed under their care or study, nor to spouses with respect to the papers or letters of either of them.
Notice that the last paragraph above expressly states that Art. 209 does not apply to “spouses with respect to the papers or letters of either of them.”
3. “What happens to your social media accounts after you die?” (The Sun)
4. “The marital right to privacy in relation to the system of absolute community” (ACCRA Law)
