Workplace Surveillance

[Shoe]

Is workplace surveillance/monitoring a real thing today? My office-life experience predates 9/11. I was doing research into #MeToo's possible effects on office romances and it sent me down a rabbit-hole of the ways companies surveil employees (reading emails, texts, cameras in restrooms, break rooms, GPS trackers in laptops and phones, tracking their social media). I assume it's all hype.

Or is it?

[Bill Hiatt]

Camera placement in restrooms seems like a strategy that could backfire big-time. As far as the other stuff is concerned, yes, a lot of companies have at least some surveillance going on, though not necessarily high tech.

Companies do have a right to read emails sent or received through the corporate system, and to track internet usage on the corporate network. Anybody has the right to look at someone else's public social media postings.

I have friends who've experienced all of those. How widespread they are, I couldn't say. GPS trackers in corporate laptops and phones are probably more about preventing theft than spying on employees.

Interesting side note. While I was teaching, there were news stories about how colleges looked at applicant's social media profiles, sometimes even catfished their way into being friended by applicants. These stories scared many seniors into changing the names on their social media accounts. (Because, of course, not posting dubious stuff online was out of the question.) A few more enterprising students created fake social media profiles for college admissions consumption. (When the abyss stares too long, sometimes the people stare back!)

[JRTomlin]

There have certainly been people who were fired for making racist or homophobic tweets, but I suspect they are reported rather than the company surveilling.

[lea_owens]

My daughter manages a large department store - she and managers of other stores often go through store video in spare time. She accidentally caught a trusted Deputy Manager doing refunds on returned items to her credit card when she saw her swipe her card at the checkout where there were  no customers. The stocktake had picked up an unusual number of large items (tv's, fridges) missing and she couldn't work out how shoplifters had taken them. Turns out, the DM would lodge them as returns when nothing was returned, and put the refund to her credit card. At first she'd replace the money and log the item as sold again so that everything added up, but then just kept the money, so the stock take figures were out. She ended up taking at least 50k that they know of - clearly, there should be something in the computers that pick up repeated transactions with one credit card.  My daughter tells all her staff to just do the right thing and then the video surveillance will only be used to laugh at the shoplifters who stuff legs of lamb down their track pants or make fun of the man who pleasured himself in front of the television sets.

I see our high school (Australia) is putting a lot more video surveillance in to catch any theft, bullying, violence, or other incidents. Kids aren't happy about it. Teachers are divided because things can be taken out of context - you see a big hulking boy push a girl over, but you haven't seen the months of nasty jibes she's hit him with, the remarks about him being fat and stupid, the mocking, the derisive remarks, and the fact that she bullied his little sister. Of course he shouldn't push her, but he's not the brightest crayon in the box and it was the reaction he understood against ongoing attacks he didn't understand. Was it a case of bullying or escalating conflict? The video will indicate bullying and physical assault. Video surveillance can be used the wrong way.

Also - just to give into my paranoia -  you just know the Chinese and Russians are going to be hacking those systems to spy on us.

[Shoe]

I’m sure retail surveillance remains as vigilant as ever, but I was surprised at the extent surveillance has entered the office place, usually under the guise of providing security. Employing monitoring is now a big business (see “Big Brother Isn’t Just Watching: Workplace Surveillance Can Track Your Every Move”*). The company “Interguard Employee Monitoring” specializes in it.

The idea of my keystrokes being monitored by someone in HR gives me the heebie-jeebies. Writing “resume” or “date” could get you flagged. Remote workers as well get the same monitoring, such as hours spend at keyboard, word output, time spent on apps, downtime, files opened, visits to social media (they know when you’re checking your “likes” on Facebook).

On top of that, another article in The Guardian** revealed employers are installing toilets which make you sit at a 13 degree angle to make potty stops uncomfortable.

I’m so glad I’m not twenty-one and starting out in life.

Meanwhile, all that I discovered about #MeToo is that it’s had no real effect on office hanky panky outside HR.

*https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/06/workplace-surveillance-big-brother-technology

**https://www.theguardian.com/money/2019/dec/18/standardtoilet-tilted-employees-productivity

[cecilia_writer]

I think there are laws here against some of these surveillance methods in the workplace, but maybe I've just been living in a cosy fantasy world!
As I work in a place where members of the public wander about (an art gallery) there are some security measures in place in the public areas but not around the offices. It's geared up to prevent people from stealing things, though actually the security staff are more of a deterrent than the technology is.

[LilyBLily]

In the U.S., there is legal precedence that cameras in places where people have an expectation of privacy is an offense. Some sickos in the past would put secret cameras in women's restrooms.

However, contrary to what most Americans believe, there is no legal right to privacy as such--or at least there wasn't any case law supporting it back when I was in journalism school. (A long time ago.)

[JRTomlin]

My daughter manages a large department store - she and managers of other stores often go through store video in spare time. She accidentally caught a trusted Deputy Manager doing refunds on returned items to her credit card when she saw her swipe her card at the checkout where there were  no customers. The stocktake had picked up an unusual number of large items (tv's, fridges) missing and she couldn't work out how shoplifters had taken them. Turns out, the DM would lodge them as returns when nothing was returned, and put the refund to her credit card. At first she'd replace the money and log the item as sold again so that everything added up, but then just kept the money, so the stock take figures were out. She ended up taking at least 50k that they know of - clearly, there should be something in the computers that pick up repeated transactions with one credit card.  My daughter tells all her staff to just do the right thing and then the video surveillance will only be used to laugh at the shoplifters who stuff legs of lamb down their track pants or make fun of the man who pleasured himself in front of the television sets.

I see our high school (Australia) is putting a lot more video surveillance in to catch any theft, bullying, violence, or other incidents. Kids aren't happy about it. Teachers are divided because things can be taken out of context - you see a big hulking boy push a girl over, but you haven't seen the months of nasty jibes she's hit him with, the remarks about him being fat and stupid, the mocking, the derisive remarks, and the fact that she bullied his little sister. Of course he shouldn't push her, but he's not the brightest crayon in the box and it was the reaction he understood against ongoing attacks he didn't understand. Was it a case of bullying or escalating conflict? The video will indicate bullying and physical assault. Video surveillance can be used the wrong way.

Also - just to give into my paranoia -  you just know the Chinese and Russians are going to be hacking those systems to spy on us.

I am pretty convinced that the Chinese and Russians are totally uninterested in spying on us ordinary plebs. 😜

In the UK, there is CCTV practically everywhere it seems like. It seems a lot more than in the US or maybe that is just my perception.

[Shoe]

In the UK, there is CCTV practically everywhere it seems like. It seems a lot more than in the US or maybe that is just my perception.

Every British police procedural on TV alludes to CCTV cameras at some point. In the U.S., reliance on private security cams is a common trope, which for some reason always use old VHS style tapes.

[LilyBLily]

There's a lot of spying going on, and much of it is on completely boring, ordinary daily life. This shouldn't threaten any honest person, but sometimes law enforcement makes mistakes--like breaking into the wrong apartment, or arresting somebody who looks like somebody else. I have friends who actively fear that, and others who won't take a DNA test that might give family some useful genetic information because they have paranoid fears that the government will take their DNA and put it at a crime scene. I have been unsuccessful in convincing a relative that the government--any government--is not really interested in framing some random old dude for a capital crime.

The problem is mistakes do happen, and the more surveillance "evidence" there is, the more tempting it is to sloppy, ignorant, venal, and stupid people to go for the easy answer even if it's the wrong one. This is not really a paranoid fear.

 

[Bill Hiatt]

In the U.S., there is legal precedence that cameras in places where people have an expectation of privacy is an offense. Some sickos in the past would put secret cameras in women's restrooms.

However, contrary to what most Americans believe, there is no legal right to privacy as such--or at least there wasn't any case law supporting it back when I was in journalism school. (A long time ago.)

There is no one supreme court case that covers the entire concept of right to privacy. It is in some ways hinted at in the Constitution, and aspects of it have been addressed piecemeal. https://www.livescience.com/37398-right-to-privacy.html

There are also state laws in play. At least in California, surveillance cameras can't be used in the workplace without  putting up a sign that notifies people they may be under surveillance. This contrasts with your own home, if which you may put up cameras to your heart's content without notice (hence, nanny cams).

[Marti Talbott]

Well, we know phone calls are monitored when we call any customer service anywhere. I've actually sat and listened to those calls, trying to find a phone transaction that had come under scrutiny. It's been a while since I worked in an office, but my last job checked the amount of bandwidth we were using and shut us down. I hated that, because I liked listening to the radio while I worked, and the reception on ordinary radios was dismal. So I suppose if they can detect that, they can check anything they want on computers.

[Shoe]

I don't mind cameras monitoring for crime, speaking in general. As an employee, I would REALLY mind having my keystrokes monitored or output mined for flags (especially if I was remote). Company sponsored GPS monitoring would also be a deal breaker, along with social media snooping.

I know it's worse in the blue collar world, particularly in warehouses, delivery services, and manufacturing.

 

[Marti Talbott]

I don't mind cameras monitoring for crime, speaking in general. As an employee, I would REALLY mind having my keystrokes monitored or output mined for flags (especially if I was remote). Company sponsored GPS monitoring would also be a deal breaker, along with social media snooping.

I know it's worse in the blue collar world, particularly in warehouses, delivery services, and manufacturing.

Funny thing, I hear California passed a law that stealing up to $950 is now just misdemeanor, so people are actually taking calculators into stores to make sure they don't steal over that amount. Some even wave at the cameras as they walk out.

It's a strange world we live in these days!