Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 772 posts

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#81

Post by mamon »

janesvilleseo wrote: post #46
ditonal wrote: post #40

One thing that happens in SV is: * Employer says "hey, we have all these convenient corporate app, wouldn't it be nice to be able to check work messages and work docs on your mobile? Just install our app to "corp-ify" your phone" * Employer now views your mobile device as containing sensitive company IP and therefore they have the right to snoop on anything on your phone. If you install corp on your phone, Google vie…

100% agree. People laugh at me why I carry two phones but this is the main reason. If my employer needs me to have a mobile phone they are paying for separate device and plan. It’s a little silly I need to carry 2 phones around but it makes my life so much more convenient. Unknown call on my work phone guess I’ll answer. If it’s on my personal then it’s spam. Leave company, no need to update or port my number. Want t…

Another important thing: under US law should there be any legal dispute, or investigation involving your employer you might be required to submit your work phone for search. If you don't want court, SEC or FBI going through your private stuff then it's better to keep those things on a different phone.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#82

Post by ed25519FUUU »

macspoofing wrote: post #6

>Spiers was fired after she created a pop-up for Google employees visiting the IRI Consultants website. “Googlers have the right to participate in protected concerted activities,” the notification read I remember that case. Yeah - she deserved to be fired. She used an internal security tool to push her personal political views. How could that not be a fire-able offense?

> "Googlers have the right to participate in religious services. Click here to learn more about churches in your area"

For those that argue she was within her rights because what she was stating was factual and consistent with the law, can you imagine getting a popup like this?

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#83

Post by entangledqubit »

esrauch wrote: post #34
macspoofing wrote: post #6

>Spiers was fired after she created a pop-up for Google employees visiting the IRI Consultants website. “Googlers have the right to participate in protected concerted activities,” the notification read I remember that case. Yeah - she deserved to be fired. She used an internal security tool to push her personal political views. How could that not be a fire-able offense?

I don't think it's so black and white: the "security tool" is a chrome extension for sending notices to employees about the site they are visiting. An analogous situation seems like if the company had a big cork board for safety/security messages and someone posted a paper with that sentence on it next to something the company posted that was perceived as anti-union. It's unclear to me if that other scenario is prote…

I don't think the cork board analogy really works here. This sounds like a person (ab)used their position and access to the backend of a security tool (Chrome extension or not) to broadcast a non-security related message.

I think we can generally agree that if they were on a team maintaining protocol buffers and they baked an unnecessary ignored message into the encoded stream (about whatever) there should be repercussions for lack of good judgement.

Generally speaking, I am for workers self-organizing if they feel it is appropriate. It's not clear to me that Spiers should have been fired for this seemingly minor offense.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#84

Post by manfredo »

izacus wrote: post #76
manfredo wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, you have a right to participate in unionization and politics. But you don't have a right to alter company software to spread your political message. There's a big difference between holding a "Vote X" sign on a street corner on your own time, and using your position as a developer to put up "Vote X" signs on your company's website.

I think apt comparison is - if some Apple or Google engineer would push a non-authorized OTA update to all Apple/Google phones which would add a permanent political banner to homescreen - would you consider this to be a firing offense or not? And to people who are trying to justify this by process being "technically possible" - there is a non empty set of Apple and Google employees who can technically push any code t…

Pushing a banner to all phones with a political message would be a brazen abuse of one's engineering position.

This developer's change was much more narrow, it modified an internal tool that only Google employees see. But it's still breaching professionalism. If the message instead was, "Unions are corrupt and deprive people of individual agency" would that be acceptable? Especially with the unique position Google is in as our gateway to information, it's prudent to avoid employees that cannot refrain from making changes to production software to further personal politics.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#85

Post by inetknght »

fishywang wrote: post #59
ditonal wrote: post #40

One thing that happens in SV is: * Employer says "hey, we have all these convenient corporate app, wouldn't it be nice to be able to check work messages and work docs on your mobile? Just install our app to "corp-ify" your phone" * Employer now views your mobile device as containing sensitive company IP and therefore they have the right to snoop on anything on your phone. If you install corp on your phone, Google vie…

On Android, the work profile is supposed to solve that problem: you only add your corp account and install corp apps in work profile, and it's (at least supposed to be) isolated from your personal, default profile on your phone. This is even explicitly stated in work profile enabling flow. The spy activities described in the article is not about actual personal activities on the phone. One is looking at other's corp…

> the work profile is supposed to solve that problem: you only add your corp account and install corp apps in work profile

Wait until your personal phone, with its work profile, comes into scope of a work-related deposition.

You'll find just how paper thin that argument is.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#86

Post by scarmig »

pmiller2 wrote: post #53
skybrian wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to play that game, you could spam people with the text of all sorts of interesting laws. It's still an abuse of authority. But I wonder if anyone would be have been fired if it were an April fools prank?

Where's the evidence of "spamming?" Is Google "spamming" its employees on a regular basis with their "approved" messages?

When a Googler visits particular domains, she gets a message from the internal security tool like "Do not upload user data to third-party services. Use secure alternatives instead." This is to prevent employees from inadvertently causing a PII incident or violating contractual obligations to external customers.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#87

Post by oh_sigh »

muglug wrote: post #50
tsdlts wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if she instead put "Nobody has the right to enter this country illegally" it would be fine because she's just restating the law?

That would be appropriate (in this analogy) if the website was advising employees on how to jump over border walls.

What about a website for lawyers who defend illegally-entered immigrants?

ICI consultants isn't a criminal organization as far as I know, and without really knowing anything about them, I would assume the consulting services they provide don't tell companies to perform illegal acts.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#88

Post by eschneider »

ditonal wrote: post #40

One thing that happens in SV is: * Employer says "hey, we have all these convenient corporate app, wouldn't it be nice to be able to check work messages and work docs on your mobile? Just install our app to "corp-ify" your phone" * Employer now views your mobile device as containing sensitive company IP and therefore they have the right to snoop on anything on your phone. If you install corp on your phone, Google vie…

Does it flag me as an old that the last thing on earth I want to do is check work messages/docs from my phone? There's a concept of 'checking out for the day and going home' that's important to not going crazy, especially now. If something goes wrong, or there's an emergency, folks have a number they can text/call. But constantly check messages? No way.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#89

Post by AnimalMuppet »

marshray wrote: post #75
tsdlts wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if she instead put "Nobody has the right to enter this country illegally" it would be fine because she's just restating the law?

"Entering the country illegally is illegal" is restating the law. Such a statement would likely take on more meaning given the context in which it was said. "Nobody has the right to ..." is your opinion.

Well, "nobody has the legal right to..." is restating. And to me, the "legal" is rather obviously implied.

Re: Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges

#90

Post by observr9 »

Macha wrote: post #79
reaperducer wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At my company, in order to get access to the corporate email and such on your phone, they require you to install their app on the phone. Then you're required to sign a document acknowledging that when you leave the company they will remotely wipe your phone, including all of your personal apps, documents, photos, etc. Mixing personal and work hardware is never a good idea.

Yes, my last two employers have been similar. And given the requirements, both provide company phones. I run into coworkers who then decide to use the company phone as their only phone, because the company phone is usually the top of the line iPhone or Samsung Galaxy replaced every 2 years when their personal phone otherwise is some mid range Android or 2+ year old iPhone. Even when pointed out that the company can w…

> Even when pointed out that the company can wipe it when they leave

If someone intends to leave, they can first revoke the company's access to their phone.

Post reply on HN