A relationship crisis does not cancel privacy. When suspicions arise, it may seem natural to want to check the other person's phone, read a chat left open, or use a password known during the relationship. But cohabitation, marriage, and past trust do not grant a general permission to enter email accounts, social networks, home banking, or personal applications.
I will explain which behaviors mark the boundary between what you can keep and what you cannot search for, why a shared password is not a key without limits, and why gathering information improperly can create an additional problem. We will also see how to distinguish data that directly concerns you from communications belonging to others, and what paths to consider if you need to demonstrate facts relevant to a separation or to financial and family conditions.
The Relationship Does Not Grant Access to the Other’s Digital Life
Being spouses or cohabitants is not equivalent to being authorized. The duty of fidelity, assistance, and cooperation that characterizes marriage does not transform personal accounts into shared spaces. Emails, messages, photo archives, social profiles, and banking services remain attributable to their holder, even when the device is located in the shared home or is routinely used in front of the partner.
Physical availability of the phone is not enough. Finding a smartphone on the table, knowing the unlock code, or seeing an already open session does not prove that the holder consented to read all of its content. Consent, when it exists, must be referred to its concrete purpose: using an app for a family necessity, booking a trip, or managing a shared expense does not mean being able to search private conversations.
A password communicated in the past may have precise limits. A credential provided during the relationship may have been given for a circumscribed need and can be expressly revoked or even rendered incompatible by the context, for example after a de facto separation, a request not to access the account anymore, or a change in management habits. The decisive fact is not merely knowing the password, but still having the right to use it for that access.
The GDPR is not a license to check. The European Regulation excludes from its scope certain processing activities carried out by a natural person for exclusively personal or household activities. However, this exclusion, provided for by Article 2 of EU Regulation 2016/679, does not authorize intrusions into others' accounts, readings of confidential correspondence, or dissemination of private data. The lawfulness of these behaviors must also be evaluated in light of criminal laws and the rights of the person involved.
Passwords, Accounts, and Surveillance Applications
Accessing a protected account without right may have criminal relevance. Article 615-ter of the criminal code concerns unlawful introduction into a computer or telematics system protected by security measures and remaining in the system against the will of the person who can exclude access. An email, a cloud, a social profile, or a banking service protected by a password normally fall within the issue: the circumstance that the credential is known does not by itself eliminate the question of authorization.
It is not necessary to guess or force a password. Even using credentials received some time before, retrieved from a device, or memorized by the browser can be an access without right if the holder no longer consents to that consultation. The discipline of computer crimes, modified by law of 28 June 2024, no. 90, also considers conduct concerning codes, keywords, and other access tools: the regulatory text can be consulted in the Official Gazette of Law no. 90 of 2024.
A surveillance app is not a neutral way to obtain clarifications. Installing or having programs installed that record keystrokes, copy notifications, read messages, or track a phone's activity can involve different rules: unlawful access, interception of computer or telematics communications, and use of tools directed at intercepting them. The concrete gravity depends on how the program operates, what data it collects, and who is being monitored; precisely for this reason, it is not prudent to treat these applications as a simple domestic tool.
Dissemination can aggravate the damage. Sending screenshots to relatives, friends, colleagues, or online groups does not make information more reliable and can extend the invasion of the private sphere. One thing is to hand over, in the appropriate context, a document relevant to those who must assist you or to the judge; another thing is to publish or circulate conversations and images to exert pressure, humiliate, or gather consensus around one's own version of the facts.
Chats, Emails, and Messages: What You Receive Is Not What You Go Looking For
You can keep with greater caution what directly concerns you. If you receive a message, an email, or a voice note on your number or your account, you do not need to enter another person's inbox to keep its content. In this case, the point is not secretly obtaining a communication between other people, but keeping track of what was sent to you. It is still useful not to artificially crop the conversation and not to alter dates, profile names, or contents.
Conversations between the other partner and third parties remain confidential. Reading a chat between the spouse and another person, even if it appears on a momentarily unattended device, is different from keeping a communication of which you are the recipient. Electronic correspondence also receives protection through Article 616 of the criminal code, which considers computer or telematics correspondence as correspondence as well. A suspicion, no matter how understandable, does not create a general right to check.
Recording and disseminating are distinct issues. One must not confuse a conversation in which you participate with communications exchanged by other people. In any case, the way in which a content is obtained, kept, and used can have different consequences from its mere existence. If the issue concerns threats, pressures, violence, blackmail, or digital control, avoiding invasive autonomous initiatives is even more important: the priority becomes securing the person and keeping only the elements already legitimately available.
Badly Obtained Evidence Does Not Automatically Become Good Evidence
The formula unusable evidence has a technical meaning. In criminal proceedings, Article 191 of the code of criminal procedure establishes that evidence acquired in violation of prohibitions set by law cannot be used. This rule, which can be consulted in the text of Article 191 of the code of criminal procedure, does not allow asserting that every screenshot gathered in a family crisis is automatically unusable in any judgment.
A family court case is not resolved with an automatic rule. The production of chats, emails, or images can raise questions about the origin of the material, its integrity, its pertinence, and compliance with confidentiality. The judge evaluates the elements in the context of the proceedings; a content acquired through a possible unlawful act is not made lawful by the mere fact that it could be useful to the case. At the same time, a directly received message does not lose all relevance just because it is digital.
The content must prove a truly relevant fact. Accumulating private conversations to prove a generically bad conduct often distances one from the objective. In a separation, according to the claim brought, facts relating to family life, children, economic capacity, violence or threats, compliance with agreements and orders can count. Curiosity about the other's entire digital life does not coincide with the necessity to prove one of these facts.
Keeping well is different from multiplying copies. If you legitimately possess an important message, it is preferable to keep the original on the device or in the account, note when you received it, and keep the conversation in its context. Selective forwarding, manual transcriptions, and cropped screenshots can make it harder to reconstruct who wrote, when, and with what meaning. Do not delete contents or modify accounts to react: this choice too can compromise the reconstruction of facts.
How to Search for Useful Information Without Entering Others' Accounts
Economic needs have their own tools. If the separation concerns maintenance, contribution to expenses, or children, it is not necessary to secretly obtain the other's bank statement through their home banking. In family proceedings, when there are economic claims or minor children, Article 473-bis.12 of the code of civil procedure provides for the attachment of tax returns, documentation on assets and corporate shares, and statements of banking and financial relationships from the last three years.
The requested documentation is an alternative to surveillance. The rule is included in the reform of civil proceedings, in legislative decree no. 149 of 2022. It does not mean that anyone can obtain every personal data of the other outside the proceedings; however, it shows that when incomes and assets are truly relevant, the proceeding provides documentary channels instead of clandestine access to credentials.
Daily facts can also emerge from non-digital sources. Receipts, wire transfers of which you are a party, communications sent to you, contracts also in your name, documents relating to children, and testimonies on directly perceived circumstances can be more useful than a chat archive extracted without consent. Each element must be connected to a precise fact: an expense, an agreement, an episode, an economic availability, or a behavior that affects the claim.
In cases of violence, the path changes. When abuse or domestic or gender violence is alleged, the code of civil procedure grants the judge specific investigative powers, including the acquisition of acts and documents from public offices and, within expected limits, information from authorities. Article 473-bis.44 is reported in the text of the reform of family proceedings. If you fear for your safety, do not tackle the problem by searching for passwords or installing monitoring tools.
Before Acting, Separate the Need to Know from the Right to Access
The right question is what you need to prove. If you want to understand if there is a parallel relationship, an economic difficulty, a threat, or a violation of agreements, first identify the concrete fact that can have relevance. This approach reduces the risk of transforming personal suffering into an indiscriminate gathering of data, with consequences that can also fall back on the person performing it.
Stopping can be a protective choice. Do not attempt repeated accesses, do not ask friends to enter others' accounts, do not forward passwords, and do not install monitoring software. If you have already received communications that you consider important, keep the material without tampering with it and without disseminating it. We can then distinguish together what legitimately comes from you from what requires procedural tools or a different form of proof.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I use a password that was communicated to me during the relationship?
Not automatically. You must distinguish the fact of knowing a password from the current right to use it. A credential may have been communicated for a limited purpose, such as managing a booking or a shared expense, and the authorization can be revoked or become incompatible with the end of the relationship. Using it to consult emails, chats, or personal data exposes one to the risk of unauthorized access.
The phone is at home and has no lock: can I look at the chats?
No, the absence of a lock does not count as consent. The device left accessible in the shared home does not become a shared archive. The lack of a password can affect the technical reconstruction of a conduct, but it does not transform private communications into freely consultable contents. What matters is whether you had real authorization to enter those very applications and read those messages.
Can I keep messages that my partner sends to me?
Yes, you can keep them with care. A message addressed to you is different from a conversation obtained by entering the other's account. Maintain, when possible, the complete conversation and the original on the device, without cuts that change the meaning of the words. Subsequent use in a judgment depends on its pertinence and the rules of the proceeding, not solely on the existence of the screenshot.
Are chats obtained without consent always unusable?
There is no automatic answer valid for every proceeding. The unusability regulated by Article 191 of the code of criminal procedure concerns evidence gathered by violating legal prohibitions in criminal trials. In a family case, the origin, integrity, relevance, and confidentiality of the material remain to be evaluated. In any case, the potential usefulness of a chat does not eliminate the risks connected to the way it was obtained.
To prove the other's income, must I enter their home banking?
No, you must not do it. Accessing the other's banking app requires effective authorization and cannot be replaced by the necessity to prepare an economic claim. When there are minor children or requests for economic contribution, the family proceeding requires specific income, asset, and banking documentation. Documents you already legitimately possess can be useful, but they do not justify the use of reserved credentials.
A Choice That Protects You Too
Seeking evidence must not create a new problem. In a relationship crisis, it is easy to confuse the desire to know with the right to access. If you already have materials that directly concern you or you must face separation, children, expenses, threats, or digital control, you can contact me: we can identify the relevant facts and the paths that allow protecting them without invading the private sphere of the other person.