3 ms·

Staff surveillance in SV tech firms

46 points by mprev 9y ago

runciblespoon 9y ago
“The counterbalance to giving you this huge trusting environment is if anyone steps out of line, they’ll squash you like a bug.” And water is wet :]
nailer 9y ago
> Companies will also hire external agencies to surveil their staff. One such firm, Pinkerton, counts Google and Facebook among its clients. Whoa. Pinkerton (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_union_busting_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_union_busting_in_th...) still exists? Edit: yep. Same company: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinkerton_(detective_agency) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinkerton_(detective_agency)
bob_theslob646 9y ago
>"Zuckerberg hosts weekly meetings where he shares details of unreleased new products and strategies in front of thousands of employees. Even junior staff members and contractors can see what other teams are working on by looking at one of many of the groups on the company’s internal version of Facebook." No kidding they watch! When you are a publicly traded company, any form of information that is leaked, can have an enormous effect on the price. As a former trader, I would live for those days of information leak! (What Drives Stock Price Behavior Following Extreme One-Day Returns)(2003)[http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1475-6803.00048/full http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1475-6803.00048/f...] (How do stocks react to extreme market events? Evidence from Brazil)(2017)[https://www.mcgill.ca/desautels/files/desautels/overreaction_to_extreme_market_events_in_brazil_ribaf42dec2017.pdf https://www.mcgill.ca/desautels/files/desautels/overreaction...]
pavement 9y ago
Hmmm, a dearth of activity on an article about employers expending significant effort, prying into extracurricular social media activity. Maybe this article just "isn't very interesting" and suddenly there are better things to discuss elsewhere.
alexandercrohde 9y ago
Semi-unrelated, but for those of you who use slack at work and want to know if it's monitored, any employee can see the team's "export policy." Just google it and you'll see who has access in a few simple steps.
cryoshon 9y ago
"Some employees switch their phones off or hide them out of fear that their location is being tracked. One current Facebook employee who recently spoke to Wired asked the reporter to turn off his phone so the company would have a harder time tracking if it had been near the phones of anyone from Facebook." does this lend credence to the "your phone is listening to you and reporting back to facebook" theory?

46 points by mprev 9y ago

“The counterbalance to giving you this huge trusting environment is if anyone steps out of line, they’ll squash you like a bug.” And water is wet :]

nailer 9y ago

> Companies will also hire external agencies to surveil their staff. One such firm, Pinkerton, counts Google and Facebook among its clients. Whoa. Pinkerton (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_union_busting_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_union_busting_in_th...) still exists? Edit: yep. Same company: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinkerton_(detective_agency) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinkerton_(detective_agency)

bob_theslob646 9y ago

>"Zuckerberg hosts weekly meetings where he shares details of unreleased new products and strategies in front of thousands of employees. Even junior staff members and contractors can see what other teams are working on by looking at one of many of the groups on the company’s internal version of Facebook." No kidding they watch! When you are a publicly traded company, any form of information that is leaked, can have an enormous effect on the price. As a former trader, I would live for those days of information leak! (What Drives Stock Price Behavior Following Extreme One-Day Returns)(2003)[http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1475-6803.00048/full http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1475-6803.00048/f...] (How do stocks react to extreme market events? Evidence from Brazil)(2017)[https://www.mcgill.ca/desautels/files/desautels/overreaction_to_extreme_market_events_in_brazil_ribaf42dec2017.pdf https://www.mcgill.ca/desautels/files/desautels/overreaction...]

pavement 9y ago

Hmmm, a dearth of activity on an article about employers expending significant effort, prying into extracurricular social media activity. Maybe this article just "isn't very interesting" and suddenly there are better things to discuss elsewhere.

alexandercrohde 9y ago

Semi-unrelated, but for those of you who use slack at work and want to know if it's monitored, any employee can see the team's "export policy." Just google it and you'll see who has access in a few simple steps.

cryoshon 9y ago

"Some employees switch their phones off or hide them out of fear that their location is being tracked. One current Facebook employee who recently spoke to Wired asked the reporter to turn off his phone so the company would have a harder time tracking if it had been near the phones of anyone from Facebook." does this lend credence to the "your phone is listening to you and reporting back to facebook" theory?