Glassdoor not so anonymous • Hacker News Board

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#91

Post by olliej » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:16 AM UTC

I mean if the reviews violate NDAs why shouldn't they be able to?

If they don't violate NDAs and the allegations aren't true, why shouldn't they be able to?

Finally, if Glassdoor is anonymous, why would they have any records of anyone who posts a review? If you want to claim some content has an anonymous author, you, the company hosting the content, cannot have any ability to identify the author. Otherwise all this "anonymous" info is a hack, malicious employee, or lawsuit away from no longer being anonymous.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#92

Post by willcipriano » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:16 AM UTC

mypalmike wrote: post #87

willcipriano wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would have to prove the statement is false in court and that they suffered harm due to it. Otherwise it's protected free speech.

That depends on jurisdiction. Not all countries protect truthful disparaging public remarks.

You are right. I should have added it only applies to countries that have free speech.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#93

Post by lotsofpulp » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:16 AM UTC

feet wrote: post #90

lotsofpulp wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much everyone is carrying around a pocket computer connected to the internet 24/7 with which they can do all their non work related tasks on, including badmouthing their employer.

How many get connected to company WiFi?

They all have the ability to disconnect with a swipe and a tap. Life does not get much easier.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#94

Post by alisonatwork » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:17 AM UTC

amatecha wrote: post #49

colinmhayes wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Glassdoors business model is selling the ability to take down bad reviews. Why would they out their customers?

Hmm, that doesn't correlate with what they say[0] on their support site: "No! Employers cannot pay Glassdoor to remove reviews." That said, it seems like negative reviews can easily end up violating one of the many other terms of use[1] around review content. Specifically that a user will not: "Post Content that is defamatory, libelous, or fraudulent"... and "Act in a manner that is [...] otherwise objectionable (as…

This is what I presume is happening too.

I have worked at several companies that received a lot of poor reviews and often what happens if you keep track of those reviews over several months is that they "mysteriously" disappear. Of course by that point the person who left the review has probably moved on to a new job and can't be bothered writing another review that is sufficiently vague as to avoid potential removal. One company I worked at even had its overall rating significantly messed with (over 0.5 change within a month), as those old reviews disappeared and "mysteriously" a bunch of vapid positive reviews appeared.

All that said, I still check Glassdoor before every job I interview for. You just need to be mindful - especially for larger companies who can afford the time to curate their reviews - that the score is perhaps a little inflated, and that the reviews that remain are as tactfully-worded as possible to avoid deletion.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#95

Post by pcurve » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:20 AM UTC

el_benhameen wrote: post #40

croes wrote: post #15

> Zuru hasn't simply alleged that it suffered a loss; Zuru’s cofounders declared, under penalty of perjury, that because of the negative reviews, Zuru had to spend more money to recruit job candidates for a particular position. ” Does Zuru have proof it's because of negative reviews and not other causes?

I mean, they’re gonna have to spend a hell of a lot more on recruiting now that the Streisand effect has kicked in.

I don't think they really thought this through.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#96

Post by chaps » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:21 AM UTC

xmprt wrote: post #67

chaps wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty uncool to give employers ideas on how to force their IT staff to rat out employees who speak out. Edit: yikes, people.

Or cool to give employees an understanding that employers aren't their friends and can and will go to extreme lengths to screw them over if it benefits the corporation. Also just general advice to avoid doing things on your company laptop if you don't want your employer to know about them.

That's all fine and dandy and I agree that employees should be informed of these methods. My issue is more with the framing of the post, which clearly doesn't have a cautionary spirit that informs those who'd potentially affected by a vindictive employer. Instead, it's playful curiosity of how to rat out an employee.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#97

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:22 AM UTC

kelnos wrote: post #23

gruez wrote: post #9

>Glassdoor’s FAQ goes into a little more detail about how they will defend user anonymity. They know this is vital their success: If glassdoor cares so much about anonymity, why didn't they engineer their site in such a way that prevents them from being able to deanonymize reviewers? For instance, not keeping identifying user details after they have been verified?

Probably because doing so is hard. You not only have to verify that a review is coming from an actual current or former employee, but then you have to ensure that the same employee cannot write multiple reviews. If you discard all links between a reviewer account and a review, how do you do that? I imagine there's some sort of zero-knowledge magic cryptographic thing you can do (or maybe something simpler, like a...…

[deleted]

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#98

Post by mlyle » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:24 AM UTC

lostcolony wrote: post #42

300bps wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. That statement is the worst kind of review any potential employee could ever read.

Yeah. Definitely Streisand effected themselves. Wonder if they can sue their own legal counsel for causing themselves so much monetary loss (given that's the grounds they're using to de-anonymize the reviewers)?

Yah. The reviews didn't even look that bad.

Nothing like getting lots of press for suing critical employees to improve your rep.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#99

Post by surement » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:24 AM UTC

This is interesting but a more accurate title would be "New Zealand law allows corporations to sue Glassdoor for user data." As the article notes:

> statements of “pure opinion” are protected by the First Amendment in America. But New Zealand doesn’t have this. Statements of opinion are not categorically protected.

That said, the warning that Glassdoor adds to the pages of companies that do this has to be the biggest warning not to go work for these companies; definitely a bigger deal than a couple of bad reviews.

Re: Glassdoor not so anonymous

#100

Post by altdataseller » Tue, Jul 19, 2022, 2:27 AM UTC

chaps wrote: post #35

Once had a contract where my client wanted me to do "security work", which was initially meant to be for pentesting their clients, but it turned into me building their wifi auth system. At some point in the gig, one of their clients went to them asking them if it was possible to de-anonymize someone glassdoor review since someone still-employed worked with them. They then went to me to see if I could do it for them.…

It might be possible to do linguistic analysis (ie. What they did to catch the Unabomber) to compare the language they used in the review vs how someone usually write in things like performance reviews, manager evaluations, emails, etc