Employee monitoring software

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Employee monitoring software, also known as bossware or tattleware, is a means of employee monitoring, and allows company administrators to monitor and supervise all their employee computers from a central location. [1] It is normally deployed over a business network and allows for easy centralized log viewing via one central networked PC. Sometimes, companies opt to monitor their employees using remote desktop software instead. [2]

Contents

Purpose

Employee monitoring software is used to supervise employees' performance, prevent illegal activities, avoid confidential info leakage, and catch insider threats. Nowadays employee monitoring software is widely used in technology companies. [3]

Features

An employee monitoring system can monitor almost everything on a computer, such as keystrokes and passwords entered, websites visited, chats in Facebook Messenger, Skype and other social media. A piece of monitoring software can also capture screenshots of mobile activities. E-mail monitoring includes employers having access to records of employee’s e-mails that are sent through the company’s servers. [4] Companies may use keyword searches to natural language processing to analyze e-mails. [4] The administrator can view the logs through a cloud panel, or receive the logs by email.

Other kinds of monitoring include webcam and/or microphone activation, and "invisible" monitoring. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] Employee monitoring software has been called a form of spyware. [6] [9] During the COVID-19 pandemic, the use of these systems by companies to monitor their employees increased. [8] [10]

Criticism

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which originated the term "bossware", has denounced employee monitoring software as a violation of privacy. [7] [11] The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) denounced bossware as a threat to the safety and health of employees. [12]

During the COVID-19 pandemic, members of the r/antiwork subreddit shared various mouse jiggler strategies to combat monitoring software intended to monitor the productivity of remote workers. [6]

A study by Reports and Data predicts that the global market for employee remote monitoring software will hit $1.3 billion by 2027. [13]

See also

Related Research Articles

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Keystroke logging, often referred to as keylogging or keyboard capturing, is the action of recording (logging) the keys struck on a keyboard, typically covertly, so that a person using the keyboard is unaware that their actions are being monitored. Data can then be retrieved by the person operating the logging program. A keystroke recorder or keylogger can be either software or hardware.

Computer and network surveillance is the monitoring of computer activity and data stored locally on a computer or data being transferred over computer networks such as the Internet. This monitoring is often carried out covertly and may be completed by governments, corporations, criminal organizations, or individuals. It may or may not be legal and may or may not require authorization from a court or other independent government agencies. Computer and network surveillance programs are widespread today and almost all Internet traffic can be monitored.

Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) is a Washington, D.C.-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organisation that advocates for digital rights and freedom of expression. CDT seeks to promote legislation that enables individuals to use the internet for purposes of well-intent, while at the same time reducing its potential for harm. It advocates for transparency, accountability, and limiting the collection of personal information.

Crimeware is a class of malware designed specifically to automate cybercrime.

Email privacy is a broad topic dealing with issues of unauthorized access to, and inspection of, electronic mail, or unauthorized tracking when a user reads an email. This unauthorized access can happen while an email is in transit, as well as when it is stored on email servers or on a user's computer, or when the user reads the message. In countries with a constitutional guarantee of the secrecy of correspondence, whether email can be equated with letters—therefore having legal protection from all forms of eavesdropping—is disputed because of the very nature of email.

Workplace privacy is related with various ways of accessing, controlling, and monitoring employees' information in a working environment. Employees typically must relinquish some of their privacy while in the workplace, but how much they must do can be a contentious issue. The debate rages on as to whether it is moral, ethical and legal for employers to monitor the actions of their employees. Employers believe that monitoring is necessary both to discourage illicit activity and to limit liability. With this problem of monitoring employees, many are experiencing a negative effect on emotional and physical stress including fatigue, lowered employee morale and lack of motivation within the workplace. Employers might choose to monitor employee activities using surveillance cameras, or may wish to record employees activities while using company-owned computers or telephones. Courts are finding that disputes between workplace privacy and freedom are being complicated with the advancement of technology as traditional rules that govern areas of privacy law are debatable and becoming less important.

Computer security software or cybersecurity software is any computer program designed to influence information security. This is often taken in the context of defending computer systems or data, yet can incorporate programs designed specifically for subverting computer systems due to their significant overlap, and the adage that the best defense is a good offense.

Employee monitoring is the surveillance of workers' activity. Organizations engage in employee monitoring for different reasons such as to track performance, to avoid legal liability, to protect trade secrets, and to address other security concerns. This practice may impact employee satisfaction due to its impact on the employee's privacy. Among organizations, the extent and methods of employee monitoring differ.

Magic Lantern is keystroke logging software created by the United States' Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Magic Lantern was first reported in a column by Bob Sullivan of MSNBC on November 20, 2001 and by Ted Bridis of the Associated Press.

Cyber spying, cyber espionage, or cyber-collection is the act or practice of obtaining secrets and information without the permission and knowledge of the holder of the information using methods on the Internet, networks or individual computers through the use of proxy servers, cracking techniques and malicious software including Trojan horses and spyware. Cyber espionage can be used to target various actors- individuals, competitors, rivals, groups, governments, and others- in order to obtain personal, economic, political or military advantages. It may wholly be perpetrated online from computer desks of professionals on bases in far away countries or may involve infiltration at home by computer trained conventional spies and moles or in other cases may be the criminal handiwork of amateur malicious hackers and software programmers.

Computer surveillance in the workplace is the use of computers to monitor activity in a workplace. Computer monitoring is a method of collecting performance data which employers obtain through digitalised employee monitoring. Computer surveillance may nowadays be used alongside traditional security applications, such as closed-circuit television.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FinFisher</span> Surveillance software

FinFisher, also known as FinSpy, is surveillance software marketed by Lench IT Solutions plc, which markets the spyware through law enforcement channels.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tailored Access Operations</span> Unit of the U.S. National Security Agency

The Office of Tailored Access Operations (TAO), now Computer Network Operations, and structured as S32, is a cyber-warfare intelligence-gathering unit of the National Security Agency (NSA). It has been active since at least 1998, possibly 1997, but was not named or structured as TAO until "the last days of 2000," according to General Michael Hayden.

Retina-X Studios is a software manufacturer company that develops computer and cell phone monitoring applications, focused on computers, smartphones, tablets and networks. The company is founded in 1997 and it is based in Jacksonville, Florida, United States.

Awareness Technologies is a Westport, Connecticut-based American technology company founded in 2002. The company provides security, monitoring, forensic, data loss prevention, productivity and analytics solutions for home, office, and enterprise.

HackingTeam was a Milan-based information technology company that sold offensive intrusion and surveillance capabilities to governments, law enforcement agencies and corporations. Its "Remote Control Systems" enable governments and corporations to monitor the communications of internet users, decipher their encrypted files and emails, record Skype and other Voice over IP communications, and remotely activate microphones and camera on target computers. The company has been criticized for providing these capabilities to governments with poor human rights records, though HackingTeam states that they have the ability to disable their software if it is used unethically. The Italian government has restricted their licence to do business with countries outside Europe.

Corporate surveillance describes the practice of businesses monitoring and extracting information from their users, clients, or staff. This information may consist of online browsing history, email correspondence, phone calls, location data, and other private details. Acts of corporate surveillance frequently look to boost results, detect potential security problems, or adjust advertising strategies. These practices have been criticized for violating ethical standards and invading personal privacy. Critics and privacy activists have called for businesses to incorporate rules and transparency surrounding their monitoring methods to ensure they are not misusing their position of authority or breaching regulatory standards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">NSO Group</span> Israeli cyber-espionage and malware firm

NSO Group Technologies is an Israeli cyber-intelligence firm primarily known for its proprietary spyware Pegasus, which is capable of remote zero-click surveillance of smartphones. It employed almost 500 people as of 2017.

Stalkerware is monitoring software or spyware that is used for cyberstalking. The term was coined when people started to widely use commercial spyware to spy on their spouses or intimate partners. Stalkerware has been criticized because of its use by abusers, stalkers, and employers.

References

  1. ↑ "What Is Employee Monitoring Software? (with pictures)". wiseGEEK. Archived from the original on 2018-01-02. Retrieved 2018-01-02.
  2. ↑ "What is employee monitoring?". WhatIs.com. Archived from the original on 16 February 2018. Retrieved 16 February 2018.
  3. ↑ Ciocchetti, Corey A. (2011). "The Eavesdropping Employer: A Twenty-First Century Framework for Employee Monitoring". American Business Law Journal. 48 (2): 285–369. doi:10.1111/j.1744-1714.2011.01116.x. ISSN   1744-1714.
  4. 1 2 Spitzmüller, Christiane; Stanton, Jeffrey M. (June 2006). "Examining employee compliance with organizational surveillance and monitoring". Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology. 79 (2): 245–272. doi:10.1348/096317905x52607. ISSN   0963-1798.
  5. ↑ Gilliland, Donald (2021-07-24). "Warning: Your boss is probably spying on you — and it could be bad for your health". The Hill . Retrieved 2021-12-22.
  6. 1 2 3 Cole, Samantha (2021-12-08). "Workers Are Using 'Mouse Movers' So They Can Use the Bathroom in Peace". Vice . Retrieved 2021-12-22.
  7. 1 2 Cyphers, Bennett; Gullo, Karen (2020-06-30). "Inside the Invasive, Secretive "Bossware" Tracking Workers". Electronic Frontier Foundation . Retrieved 2021-12-22.
  8. 1 2 Klosowski, Thorin (2021-02-10). "How Your Boss Can Use Your Remote-Work Tools to Spy on You". The New York Times . Retrieved 2021-12-22.
  9. 1 2 Crispin, Jessa (2021-09-16). "Employers are spying on us at home with 'tattleware'. It's time to track them instead". The Guardian . Retrieved 2021-12-22.
  10. ↑ ‘Bossware is coming for almost every worker’: the software you might not realize is watching you The Guardian. 2022.
  11. ↑ "Warning: Bossware May Be Hazardous To Your Health" (PDF). Center for Democracy & Technology. 2021. Retrieved 2024-05-15.
  12. ↑ Scherer, Matt (2021-09-16). "Strategies to Tackle Bossware's Threats to the Health & Safety of Workers". Center for Democracy and Technology . Retrieved 2021-12-22.
  13. ↑ "Workplace monitoring platform Aware takes in $60M". VentureBeat. 2021-10-13. Retrieved 2022-08-09.
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