Brit bank Barclays probed amid claims bosses used high-tech to spy on staff, measure productivity
- Reference: 1597086413
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/08/10/barclays_employee_monitoring/
- Source link:
Back in February, the bank trialled tracking software to detail the amount of time employees spent at their desk, as [1]revealed by City AM .
Last week an employee received a “work yoga” assessment on their daily performance informing them they had spent “not enough time in the Zone yesterday,” the City paper reports. The report recommended: “Tips: mute the phone, disable email/chat pop-ups, avoid breaks for 20+ minutes, 2–3 times a day.”
A spokesperson for the Information Commissioner's Office told The Register today: "We have an ongoing investigation relating to Barclays’ alleged use of employee monitoring tools.”
If you want a vision of the future, imagine not a boot stamping on a face, but keystroke logging on govt contractors' PCs [2]READ MORE
“People expect that they can keep their personal lives private and that they are also entitled to a degree of privacy in the workplace.
“If organisations wish to monitor their employees, they should be clear about its purpose and that it brings real benefits. Organisations also need to make employees aware of the nature, extent and reasons for any monitoring."
The bank was reportedly using software from Sapience Analytics to monitor how long staff were spending at their desks. It was alleged to have introduced the surveillance tool so managers could target individual workers.
An office rebellion [3]reportedly prompted Barclays to halt the monitoring and inform the ICO.
The referral was said to have been made over a potential breach of data protection laws guaranteeing employees a degree of privacy in the workplace.
Such privacy-busting moves are not exclusive to Barclays, however. In 2011 Microsoft went as far as [4]applying to patent employee monitoring tech , on the grounds that making staff more trusting of their employer was cheaper than a pay rise and enabled the filtering out of “undesired behaviours”.
Also in America, in 2018 a woman sued her employers claiming that a biometric clocking-in system that consisted of a fingerprint scanner [5]infringed local laws in the US state of Illinois : her fingerprints were allegedly transmitted to the fingerprint scanner manufacturer.
Just last month, Barclays was left red-faced after it was [6]caught using the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine as a CDN for seemingly critical JavaScript. ®
Bootnote
The breathless reporting of the news by the Telegraph might be seen by some as rather brave amusing; in 2016 the newspaper itself faced a staff backlash after [7]installing employee-monitoring devices in its own newsroom, allegedly to reduce energy usage.
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[1] https://www.cityam.com/exclusive-barclays-installs-big-brother-style-spyware-on-employees-computers/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2019/02/13/work_verification_accountability_bills/
[3] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2020/02/20/barclays-drops-staff-spying-software-backlash/
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2011/11/18/microsoft_patent_employee_monitoring/
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2018/06/04/clock_blocker_woman_sues_employer_for_unauthorized_fingerprint_collection/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/03/barclays_bank_javascript_wayback_machine/
[7] https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/jan/11/daily-telegraph-to-withdraw-devices-monitoring-time-at-desk-after-criticism
[8] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Grubby organisation
Responsible for a lot of misery, more so than most.
Barge pole icon - wouldnt touch them with
Tattler
"avoid breaks for 20+ minutes, 2–3 times a day"?
Seems like odd advice.
These systems are known as "tattlers" in the US. Truckers (lorry drivers) got the first taste of them; supposedly put on in case of truck theft, it rapidly became companies complaining about the length of fuel stops (allocating 0 time for using the restroom), objecting to 31 minutes lunches, and so on. Other than a few states like California, the US has almost no privacy protections, no protections from poor workplace practices, etc., but de facto they have workplace revolts (I don't think it usually gets as far as a strike) when they get too heavy-handed with the tattlers.
On the one hand, I would not care to do all the work while spending time with a bunch of freeloaders; on the other hand, I've worked for places that try to track time down t the second and they tend to be the stingiest bunch of bastards you'll ever see.
One I worked for "generously" (they used the term generously!) provided 2 days of paid time off per year -- and that 2 days PER YEAR included sick leave! I don't necessarily expect to get paid for work when I'm not working; but, they had no provision for *unpaid* time off, they thought after I got a cold and was home sick for 2 days that I was NEVER going to take a day off for the rest of the year even if I was sick! I quit when I was getting top performance ratings, but got a talking too anyway because I was "almost" late every day -- I was never late, but only coming with a minute or two to spare, they really thought I should be coming in 15 minutes ahead of time. I pointed out if they wanted me there 15 minutes earlier they could start the workday 15 minutes early and pay for it. My recollection is I did not quit on the spot right then, but not that long after that.
Re: Tattler
"almost late"
when punctual isn't good enough.
Most contractors there didn't have a regular desk...
...I was fortunate that the area I was contracting into had a desk I could use when I was there.
Anyone who cares to check the little black box under the desk (far corner of a first floor desk in Babbage House) might still find the folded up post it note with "Do not spy, not cool!" trapped between the battery and the contacts of a "desk utilisation monitor" :)
And only recently the boss changed tack and said [1]he wanted staff back in the office . I thought when I read it that sounded like the attitude of a typical blinkered boss who wants to micromanage his workforce.
He added: "We want our people back together, to make sure we ensure the evolution of our culture and our controls, and I think that will happen over time."
Now we know what form 'our controls' take.
[1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53579428