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posted by martyb on Tuesday November 07 2017, @09:13AM   Printer-friendly
from the if-they-track-your-every-move,-it's-best-to-hold-still dept.

How can an employer make sure its remote workers aren’t slacking off on the job? In the case of talent management company Crossover, the answer is to take photos of them every 10 minutes through their webcam.

The pictures are taken by Crossover’s productivity tool, WorkSmart, and combined with screenshots of their workstations along with other data including app use and keystrokes to come up with a “focus score” and an “intensity score” that can be used to assess the value of freelancers.

Today’s workplace surveillance software is a digital panopticon that began with email and phone monitoring but now includes keeping track of web-browsing patterns, text messages, screenshots, keystrokes, social media posts, private messaging apps like WhatsApp and even face-to-face interactions with co-workers.

Good luck with that, Big Brother. My webcam's covered by duct tape.


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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Snotnose on Tuesday November 07 2017, @09:34AM (8 children)

    by Snotnose (1623) on Tuesday November 07 2017, @09:34AM (#593574)

    In my day we decided how good a person was by their results. Didn't care if they stayed in their chair for hours on end, or stayed drunk as a skunk. If the results were there they were good.

    --
    Why shouldn't we judge a book by it's cover? It's got the author, title, and a summary of what the book's about.
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @09:39AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @09:39AM (#593577)

    The schmooze was there before, but buttering up HR does more for keeping yourself retained than anything else nowadays. Won't get you out of everything (guy I know got a felony which lost him reentry at a tech company the HR director would have otherwise hired him on the spot for.)

    As stated in the summary above: I too have my webcams all covered and have gone as far as getting some family members to cover theirs as well. Never know when those cell phone are recording without your permission either.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by DannyB on Tuesday November 07 2017, @04:57PM (1 child)

      by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday November 07 2017, @04:57PM (#593719) Journal

      Never know when those cell phone are recording without your permission either.

      But you can just turn off the phone. Or remove the batteries. Oh, wait. Batteries not removable in a cell phone? That's not suspicious at all.

      --
      People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
      • (Score: 3, Informative) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday November 07 2017, @08:52PM

        by LoRdTAW (3755) on Tuesday November 07 2017, @08:52PM (#593810) Journal

        Batteries not removable in a cell phone? That's not suspicious at all.

        You're like supposed to throw them out and buy the latest iPhone.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @02:13PM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @02:13PM (#593636)

    Yeah. I feel something crucial is missing with this focus on warm bodies in seats working intensely constantly with no breaks. Does anybody evaluate the quality of work produced any more? Does anybody actually know what they're employees do? Why do we even have employees if nobody knows what they do and the reason for their job to exist? Shouldn't a job perform a necessary function?

    Or are we all just digging holes in the morning so we can fill them up in the afternoon. There's some intensity and focus. Also has the benefit of physical exercise. Contributes about as much tangible value to the economy as any other worker who does meaningless stuff that doesn't contribute towards any kind of goal.

    More and more a Matrix-like scenario seems plausible from a sociological standpoint. (From an engineering standpoint, completely bunk of course.) Need those neurons constantly firing to provide the machines (or lizard people) with their fuel. The carrot of financial security that never seems to reach one's mouth, and the stick of homelessness that will be used if the lizard people aren't satisfied with your power generation metrics.

    Well, there likely isn't a Matrix and neither are there lizard people. This is just another sign of the impending societal collapse. We think we have wealth and trade money on the basis of this imaginary wealth, and nobody can actually say what this wealth they trade around actually looks like outside of workers buzzing in a hive. There actually is no wealth being created. It's all running on momentum, all waiting for that day, a collective moment, when everybody realizes that there is no wealth being produced, nothing being maintained, and then--???--poof! Civilization collapses yet again.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @03:20PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @03:20PM (#593668)

      You sound like you expect managers to do something like work - which is so obviously totally beneath them - rather than just count butts in seats. DNOK. You'll never make the C-levels with an attitude like that.

      • (Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @06:46PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 07 2017, @06:46PM (#593763)

        Haha! Ain't it the truth!

    • (Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday November 07 2017, @10:58PM

      by Joe Desertrat (2454) on Tuesday November 07 2017, @10:58PM (#593863)

      Yeah. I feel something crucial is missing with this focus on warm bodies in seats working intensely constantly with no breaks. Does anybody evaluate the quality of work produced any more?

      If it has to do with numbers, upper management has already decided what the results should be, therefore any work you do to produce the most accurate numbers possible is simply filed away without much scrutiny.

      Does anybody actually know what their employees do? Why do we even have employees if nobody knows what they do and the reason for their job to exist? Shouldn't a job perform a necessary function?

      What you actually do is important only in the matter that you are doing something and thus part of a manager's empire.

  • (Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday November 07 2017, @08:38PM

    by Thexalon (636) on Tuesday November 07 2017, @08:38PM (#593805)

    The trouble is, if your boss isn't capable enough to figure out if you're getting results, s/he can't judge you by those results. Which means the boss has to be capable of doing your job to at least a basic degree.

    This is why most organizations are so inept: At some point, you're likely to have someone managing something they can't do themselves, which means they can't judge accurately whether their subordinates are doing a good job, which means that rewards all the way down the management chain no longer go to the most competent but to the best spin doctors.

    --
    The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.