Milan tram drivers ‘used WhatsApp for sexist chat about female passengers’

A group of tram drivers in Milan have been suspended from their jobs amid an investigation into a WhatsApp group in which they allegedly exchanged sexist and vulgar comments about images of female passengers. Milan prosecutors placed at least one employee of ATM, the city’s public transport firm, under investigation on Tuesday for allegedly accessing an IT system without authorisation and for hacking a CCTV system to obtain images of female passengers. Searches of the homes of five other male employees and the confiscation of their mobile phones and other devices have been ordered, according to reports in the Italian press. The drivers allegedly commented on photos taken from CCTV that homed in on the legs, faces, breasts and thighs of female passengers. The allegations emerged after a woman travelling on the number 15 tram on Saturday noticed an off-duty driver, still wearing his uniform and sitting in front of her, viewing a WhatsApp group chat on his phone allegedly containing such images along with sexist comments and jokes about the women’s bodies. Realising the images had come from CCTV, which is installed on every tram in Milan for safety purposes, she took a photo of the chat on the off-duty driver’s screen and sent it to a high-profile feminist activist who reported it to ATM. …