I don't think it is a strange position, what you seem to describe is actually completely illegal... You may have jumped to conclusions too rapidly. Let me try changing your mind :)

We do not prevent our users from using GMail for personal use, but we analyze the traffic for malicious or deviant patterns to detect potential data leaks. Analyzing the amount of users who inadvertently send a file in GMail then rapidly "change their mind" is still, in our shared opinion, a relevant analysis to perform. We report the number of quarterly cases in an awareness newsletter and remind users to be attentive when selecting a file to be uploaded in webmails.

Good thing: the occurrences have decreased since we raise this concern. We cannot prove it is linked to our newsletter but our "ego" enjoys believing so.

I would have agreed with you if I actually had both a username and a filename shown on my screen, but this does not happen. Our report shows the total count of cancelled uploads per country.

We have someone at HR who can actually see the detailed events (including file names) for a given user. It seems to that this would match what you see as "snooping". But this an investigation led by Human resources upon a suspicion of employee misbehavior. It has nothing to do with our infosec activities.

I hope I changed your mind, at least a little ;)

My point was that in both cases the potential for abuse exists but that users have to trust that existing policies will prevent that abuse. Why should your users trust you and not Google to follow your stated policies?

In my opinion, we offer a more trustworthy relationship in three ways: 1. We don't use ambiguous wording in our policies. 2. Any employee interested in knowing how we process these requests can actually come physically and see in detail how they are processed. 3. Our business does not depend upon our ability to harvest our employee data and monetize it.