Monitoring Technologies | Electronic Monitoring in the Workplace: Controversies and Solutions

The development of new technologies is making employers more able to concurrently monitor many aspects of their employees jobs. Such technologies, both old and new, include telephones, surveillance and monitoring software, electronic and voicemail, closed-circuit cameras, spy-Internet cameras , and computer terminal keystrokes, among others (Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, 1997).

Telephones

Employers can, and may, monitor telephone calls with clients or customers for business- related reasons like quality control. However, there are blurred lines when it comes to personal calls at work. In some states in the USA and nations worldwide, laws require the parties to be notified either by clear announcement before the conversation begins or by changes in the phone tones. Also, some laws, like a number of U.S. Federal laws on telecommunications, may require the employer to stop monitoring telephone conversations upon realising that such calls are personal. However, there is no guarantee that an employer will respect these laws.

Surveillance and Monitoring Software

Perhaps this is the most widely used form of monitoring and surveillance. Most employers use computer monitoring because developments in snooping software products have made it possible. Employees and any other suspected person can be monitored without knowing that they are being monitored . There are several software items an employer can use for surveillance and monitoring. These include:

Keystroke Monitoring. The software monitors and logs every keystroke. In addition to monitoring keystrokes, snapshots of the windows the keystrokes are typed in and the timestamps are logged, especially in newer software that does not only log plain text keystrokes. This type of monitoring has found its way beyond employee monitoring into crime fighting where law enforcement agencies are successfully using the technology to fight crime. According to Nathan Thornburgh, this is the technology the Seattle-based FBI used to nab the two notorious Russian hackers who had repeatedly broken into American business systems, stealing more than one million credit card numbers and attacking networks of over 40 businesses in 20 U.S. states (TrueActive, 2001). With keystroke monitoring, every mouse click, every e-mail sent and received, every character that is typed and erased or deleted are logged and secretly sent to the monitoring server. Keystroke monitoring is enabling employers to keep tabs on every employee. If an employee takes two minutes to veer off to a Web site, the boss will know. Software products like Investigator , WinWhatWhere, and TrueActive can, once installed, secretly record all activities conducted on a suspect computer, including Web sites visited, documents created, files deleted, and e- mails received and sent. The programs can also time stamp the activities, giving the employer, or whoever is monitoring, information on how long the suspect used a given application and the names of files used by the application. These programs can be installed as stand-alone and also on a network server.
Internet Connection. Monitors and logs every Internet activity, including logons and all sessions made from a designated computer in a network. This means that the software monitors activities of all applications from a network host like HTTP, FTP, POP3, Chat Messenger, and all TCP and UDP connections. Internet connection censoring software also records connection IP addresses of all places visited from the suspect host. In addition, the software also records all chat conversations made on all chat channels like AOL, AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, MSN Messenger, and ICQ.
Application Usage. Monitors and logs all applications that ran on a selected host. The logging also includes files opened and documents viewed by users.
Screenshot Capture. Involves frequent screenshots of the desktop. Sometimes such screenshots can be timed with regular intervals. Screenshots of the desktop enable the investigator to see almost in real time, if the time intervals are short, the activities of the suspect or employee at the monitored host. The screenshots can be logged and viewed later using the built in screenshot viewer. Screenshots also give the supervisor or investigator a chance to view all logged host activities like logons, logoffs, failed attempts, log accesses , and many more.
Remote Surveillance. Involves monitoring of one or more remote hosts activities, including desktop viewing, task management and viewing, process identification and types, password logs, and keystrokes. This capability can also be used to view all the documents a remote user has been to. It can also be used for remote start up, shut down, and restart.
Content Filtering and Blocking. Allows the supervisor or manager to filter and even block content that goes to or from a given host on the network.
Remote Freeze and Lockup. Allows a system administrator or an employer to lock up a host or free it up whenever there are questionable activities on the host.
Remote Reporting. Installed either on a host or a server, allows a system administrator or an employer to record everything anywhere on the global network and have a detailed report delivered to a specified e-mail address anywhere .
E-mail Forwarding . May be used by an employer to instantly record and monitor an employee s incoming and outgoing e-mails, including Hotmail, Yahoo mail, AOL e-mail, Outlook, and even Microsoft Exchange e-mail, and forward them immediately. A good example would be when an employee at work writes a private e-mail and sends it off at 3:30 p.m. The recording software captures the e-mail, records a copy, and immediately has it sent to the employer s e-mail address. Also, if the employee receives a personal e-mail at work, it is possible, with surveillance software, to have a copy of it sent to the employer also.

Closed Circuit Monitoring

Employee monitoring can also be done using minute, sometimes concealed, surveillance cameras pointed directly at the selected host computer to monitor and record everything that is said and done by the employee on that particular host. The recording camera is actually operated by a computer running surveillance software. In fact, this type of surveillance software that runs audio and video recording is only second to the PC and Internet surveillance software in popularity.

Real-Time Surveillance

Real-time surveillance can be done in several ways, including the use of Internet minute cameras that record and transmit real-time pictures over the Internet. A computer program works with a camera to monitor and continuously track users activities on a network host. As real-time pictures are sent over the Internet, logging also is done at the same time. With real-time transmission, an employer can view remote screens of the remote hosts, typed keystrokes, visited Internet sites histories, and used applications.

Also, real-time recording can be done using a global positioning system (GPS) tracker, which records and, using internal memory, stores data on location, speed, and direction. Using this kind of recording, an employer can keep track of where the employee is all the time. In fact, most of the tracking and delivery industries keep track of their employees using this kind of technology.