Just as it is wrong to relate personnel matters to those who have no need to know them, so too it is obviously wrong to try to find out this type of information about others. To do so is tantamount to intruding into another person’s private domain to which one has no right of entry. This is once again a severe departure from tznius. It is irrelevant whether one is looking for faults in the other person, or one is just inquisitive to know their personal affairs.
Jews took great precautions to prevent forms of intrusion:
Bilam the wicked, who certainly had no desire to see good in the Jewish people, was overwhelmed when he saw the way Jewish tents were erected. The entrance of one tent did not face the entrance of the neighboring one, so that people could not see inside one another’s tents. They knew that it is a human weakness to be inquisitive and even intrusive. They therefore took the necessary precautions and set up their tents in a way that neither family could in a moment of weakness pry on the other, or even see the others private doings by mistake. In response to this beautiful act of tznius, Bilam proclaimed מה טובו ×והליך יעקב ×ž×©×›× ×•×ª×™×š ישר×ל – “how exemplary are your tents, Yaakov; your abodes, Yisroel.” [1. Bamidbar 24:5]
It is understood that we too are to set up our homes on these lines. If necessary, one should ensure that the curtains are drawn or the blinds let down in the evening, so that people living across the street or in apartments that overlook one’s own, cannot watch all that goes on in one’s house.