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Guide to Slack import and export tools

get.slack.help

211–220 of 529 posts

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#211
post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an infinite space of solutions to your particular problem, but your chosen solution is totalitarian surveillance in the workplace because an intern got offended? I avoid workplaces which force shit like this. So do all the good developers I know, because they're people who can afford to be choosy. Bullies are pretty adept at functioning in these environments. Instead of harassing on monitored DMs, they'll mak…

> but your chosen solution is totalitarian surveillance in the workplace because an intern got offended? Sigh Totalitarianism is a socio-political paradigm, not a stand-in word to describe things you think constitute surveillance in the context of a business. Companies require the capability to maintain auditable records of employee activity on the information channels they own and manage. Your company is not recordi…

> socio-political paradigm

Sigh.

And workplaces are socio-political contexts... I didn't find it very difficult to get past his hyperbole, and I frankly find it hard to believe that you did. It isn't hard to argue that monitoring channels that even just imply privacy, regardless of whether they take place in the workplace (or in academia, or at home) is a violation of personal rights - regardless of the fact that you arbitrarily draw the line at "recording your activity in the privacy of your home or on the street."

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#212
post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an infinite space of solutions to your particular problem, but your chosen solution is totalitarian surveillance in the workplace because an intern got offended? I avoid workplaces which force shit like this. So do all the good developers I know, because they're people who can afford to be choosy. Bullies are pretty adept at functioning in these environments. Instead of harassing on monitored DMs, they'll mak…

> but your chosen solution is totalitarian surveillance in the workplace because an intern got offended? Sigh Totalitarianism is a socio-political paradigm, not a stand-in word to describe things you think constitute surveillance in the context of a business. Companies require the capability to maintain auditable records of employee activity on the information channels they own and manage. Your company is not recordi…

I think the bigger problem that the OP pointed at is that whatever adjectives you attach to this, surveillance is almost always the wrong way to change behavior, unless your desired outcome is to make everyone suspicious of everyone else.

What's stopping these folks from creating an out-of-company channel to do the bullying and attacking in coordination via that means, or tricking the victim into joining them in the new side channel?

The answer to bullying or shitty office behavior is not monitoring. That cover-your-ass because the real answer is hard. Improve your company culture. Fire people who are detrimental to the team. KNOW YOUR TEAM! So often I hear about these things and what you find is a shitty manager who has no idea how to be a manager and says "well they get their work done."

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#213

On a semi-side topic: Canadian dev here, I always immediately hard delete e-mail correspondence (both inbox and sent) with HR on anything that I feel private about, as I don't want the guys in IT reading it. I know they don't, but I also know they can . For example, I might trust the head of IT but I might not trust that new intern or "new guy" they just hired. What do you guys do when it comes to HR correspondence a…

What do you mean "hard delete"? If your place of work is using any of the big cloud email services, they should be able to get at those emails regardless of whether you've deleted them.

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#215
I read the message retention policy as a true delete for anyone not wanting to get their previously private messages grandfathered into a newly non-private policy.

Slack warns you for a channel that setting the retention policy is "truly, permanently deleted. These messages can't be restored or recovered, even by Slack"

https://i.imgur.com/63x2oee.png

https://get.slack.help/hc/en-us/articles/203457187-Customize...

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#216
post #71

Technically this was possible before this. Since the email to each slack user is an @company.com address all you need to do is take control of the employees email address, reset the slack password and login as the target user.

> Since the email to each slack user is an @company.com address Not necessarily

It turns out administrators could change the email address anyway. :)

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#218
post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are assuming that harassment was direct, sending messages to the accusers. My impression is that this was a group chatting privately about the accusers either making fun of them or coordinating actions. While this can be done through other channels (in person or private cellphone) allowing it on corporate infrastructure without monitoring is not acceptable.

If harassers, as you have mentioned, can simply switch to another channel, then what problem exactly is this measure trying to solve? I'm honestly confused.

It increases the friction of harrassment

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#219
post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an infinite space of solutions to your particular problem, but your chosen solution is totalitarian surveillance in the workplace because an intern got offended? I avoid workplaces which force shit like this. So do all the good developers I know, because they're people who can afford to be choosy. Bullies are pretty adept at functioning in these environments. Instead of harassing on monitored DMs, they'll mak…

> but your chosen solution is totalitarian surveillance in the workplace because an intern got offended? Sigh Totalitarianism is a socio-political paradigm, not a stand-in word to describe things you think constitute surveillance in the context of a business. Companies require the capability to maintain auditable records of employee activity on the information channels they own and manage. Your company is not recordi…

[deleted]

Re: Guide to Slack import and export tools

#220

Jesus, nobody here has any clue what they're talking about. Slack has allowed companies to read private messages for well over a year. It has been called "compliance exports" and you as a slack user could always see if you had them turned on, as well as which individuals had access to read your private messages. Source: CTO of a unicorn confirmed he had used this feature to read private communications (private rooms…

How fine-grained is the tool? Do you select a channel and export only the contents of that? Can you select only two users and only get messages between them? Or is it blunt and you simple download all data (the text makes it seem that way)?

I ask, because if it's the latter it borders on illegal to click on that button (and get ALL private conversations), at the very least it needs to be heavily regulated within the firm who can click it and how the downloaded data is stored / accessed.

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