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WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

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Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#271

Post by ElFitz »

selestify wrote: post #205
SoftTalker wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UBI in the ideal world replaces welfare, food stamps, and rental assistance. It's supposed to be enough for a person to live a basic, decent but pretty no-frills life. I personally don't think it would work, as it ignores economics and human nature. But that is how I understand it.

Which parts of it ignore economics and human nature?

The first thing that comes to mind is that rents would quickly adjust to extract as much money as possible from someone on UBI. And any increase on UBI would just lead to an increase in rent prices. People working while on UBI would squeeze those not working, or not earning enough, out of the housing market. Meaning people will probably need to work to afford living. So back to square one.

Now you need to figure out rent-control.

But that could screw up the construction market, reducing the incentive to build, and thus the supply. And quite possibly the quality of said supply.

And that’s just housing.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#272

Post by russellbeattie »

Literally everything you do with your work supplied hardware, software and services is fair game for your employer. If you don't like what your employer does with that access, then find a new job. Personally, I'm amazed at people who treat their work laptop like their personal property. It's not.

This is settled law, so it's not changing any time soon without legislation. In other words, don't browse pornhub or work on your startup on company equipment. It's not a hard concept.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#273

Post by ElFitz »

eropple wrote: post #120
charlie0 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure those people don't want to give up their iPhones and AC either (which also are not "natural").

And so they would...continue...to work...for things that cost more than food and shelter do?

Most likely.

But many would not need to live with the existential dread of perhaps ending up living under a bridge some day. Or skipping meals just to make rent.

Perhaps some would not need to give up on their lives and education by getting some minimum-wage job to help out their family or because of some early accident instead of going to college.

I am quite certain it could end up a net positive for society as a whole.

Reminds me of that quote:

“I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.”

And yes, it would shift the power dynamic in the workplace.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#274

Post by brewdad »

codegeek wrote: post #182
cornercasechase wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the work is not getting done, spying on people isn’t going to improve things. If you want people to work, you have to properly motivate them. That means fair wages and non-toxic management.

So you are assuming that if someone is not doing a good job, it is because they are paid unfairly and/or in a toxic env ? Thats a lot of assumption. How about the deadbeats ? Do they exist or not ?

If you can't tell your deadbeat employees without logging every minute of their workday, you are a terrible manager and should be fired.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#275

Post by ralala »

jupp0r wrote: post #70
geek_at wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> surveillance is here to stay in the United States. Europe has very strict rules about surveiling employees. Example: In Austria we are not allowed to use some of the functions that Azure-AD joined computers would be capable of because employers _might_ push remote control software the user hasn't agreed to

Germany famously just passed legislation that forces employers to record working hours for all employees.

Actually this is a EU legislation, which forces all member countries to do so.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#276

Post by bennyelv »

oneplane wrote: post #50
geek_at wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> surveillance is here to stay in the United States. Europe has very strict rules about surveiling employees. Example: In Austria we are not allowed to use some of the functions that Azure-AD joined computers would be capable of because employers _might_ push remote control software the user hasn't agreed to

Same here. Employers can't even look inside user's mailboxes because there is no guarantee that it doesn't contain anything personal. Even if the company has a rule that you're not allowed to use it for personal things, the law supersedes that and you still can't do it willy nilly.

I don't think this is correct - even under the GDPR. If the company has good reason to look inside someone's mailbox (I don't think the bar for that is particularly high for a company email account) then any personal data they encounter would be being processed under "legitimate interest" as long as they don't do anything unnecessary with it in order to achieve whatever it was they were doing.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#277

Post by mantas »

jupp0r wrote: post #75
mantas wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Universal income covering the very basic would still keep people making beyond minimum wage vulnerable. Paying meaningful money would be too expensive at scale. Then few jobs could pay meaningfully more than the universal income. Why work if you get +/- not working?

Your understanding of universal income is broken. Everybody receives a monthly income, regardless of them working or not. The incentive to earn more by working is always there.

People would still pay taxes ;) UBI is essentially a negative tax. If you make nothing - you get some money. If you make some - there's a breaking point somewhere where you pay more taxes than is UBI.

If UBI was a cushy amount covering more than the bare basics, low-tier jobs would pay a very small premium over pure UBI.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#278

Post by mantas »

candiddevmike wrote: post #82
mantas wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Universal income covering the very basic would still keep people making beyond minimum wage vulnerable. Paying meaningful money would be too expensive at scale. Then few jobs could pay meaningfully more than the universal income. Why work if you get +/- not working?

Why work now at minimum wage if it won't get you out of poverty?

And people don't work at minimum wage if welfare is close enough to it. In my country it is rather popular to sit on welfare in countryside. Grow few berries to sell in local market for cash. Maybe help neighbour in a farm or construction for cash. At the end of the day you may stash more than minimum wage working few days a month.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#279

Post by rejectfinite »

threatofrain wrote: post #2

Always request a separate laptop and phone for work, and always create a separate set of accounts.

Im amazed people work from their personal PCs

How is that allowed lol

From the company side, they dont know whats on my machine. I might have pirated everything and keyloggers out the wazoo, thats my choice.

Re: WFH – Watched from Home: Office 365 and workplace surveillance creep (2022)

#280

Post by mantas »

godelski wrote: post #253
mantas wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They ain't desirable. But who wants to pay them do nothing? Many people ain't happy to cover existing welfare. Increase welfare and even more people would feel it's unfair.

> They ain't desirable. But who wants to pay them do nothing? I do. Because these sentences are in opposition, not support. If they are undesirable in the workforce (reduce productivity or whatever) then why would you want them working? If they drain x dollars from the system, UBI costs y dollars, and if y Here's how I see it: if the measure of a man is how he treats someone who can give him nothing, then the measure…

Humans are not rational economic units. There's much more at play. My issue with UBI (and too lax welfare in general) is cultural issues. Once you get multiple generations of people who never worked.. It's not good.

Personally I think USSR was somewhat close to UBI. Working was mandatory and pay was crap. But everybody looked the other way when somebody slacked or was drunk at work all the time. It was next to impossible to get fired for poor performance or drink at work and so on. The result was that good chunk of population abused this by drinking their days away and doing least possible amount of work. While other portion of population was fed up with the former and didn't give a fuck either. Productivity was very low. Aside from shadow economy where the later group worked their asses off. Doing their best to build a good life for themselves and not support slackers too much.

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