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Wtf, people who work at computers, having to work in offices, now? It’s the very worst it’s ever been! What are they thinking? I’d expect almost everyone who w

Wtf, people who work at computers, having to work in offices, now? It’s the very worst it’s ever been! What are they thinking? I’d expect almost everyone who works at a computer screen to be working from home since March. Even if it requires expensive technical solutions to ensure it. I can’t imagine moderators need more than an internet connection and computer.

delroth 6y ago
My understanding is that there are certain legal requirements associated with content moderators who may have to review illegal content, especially around child abuse / sexual imagery. This is what I've been told in the past by friends in other companies working on content moderation -- I don't have any specific evidence for or against it, but it passes the smell test. The whole thing in the article about Facebook suddenly trying to automate this part of the content moderation job seems to also point in that direction. > Management told moderators that we should no longer see certain varieties of toxic content coming up in the review tool from which we work— such as graphic violence or child abuse, for example.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- sleepybrett 6y ago
  If they are forced to be in the office then the office should be as covid safe as possible. I imagine these content moderators work in something akin to a facebookized phone bank 'pit'. Given that no other facebook employees are being forced to work in their expansive offices perhaps the content moderators, if they are required to work on site for security purposes, should be given the run of the empty space. That way they can easily social distance appropriately.
  - bilbo0s 6y ago
    Lots of space to do the work does seem like the most reasonable, and obvious, solution to the problem.
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  The thing is, what if something slips through? My principle concern would be, no matter the employment relationship, you can't contract away criminal liability. (At least, not in the US.) So here you opened something while working from home, that maybe your state's child sex trafficking task force was tracking. It could just get messy. I'm not sure I would even want to do that kind of work from home.
  - conductr 6y ago
    Isn’t being on a company laptop and VPN enough to equate you being “at work”? In healthcare, totally different but highly regulated, we can let people work from home with HIPAA protected info by securing the way they work and access the info.
    - hunter2_ 6y ago
      Not an expert, but I can imagine that a VPN and company laptop doesn't matter in the least when it comes down to Facebook sending certain material to employees, a legal battle coming of it, and the transmission occurring within vs. across state lines. There must be some solution though, like requiring that the VPN connection originate from an address considered to be in the same state.
      - CaptainZapp 6y ago
        Given that some US states are so fucking crazy to brand a 15 year old, who sends a sext of herself as a kiddie pornographer and a sex offender for life you may be on to something here. It seems ridiculous, but very possible. That doesn't excuse Facebook's despicable treatment of their contractors who have to wade through that filth.
- alkonaut 6y ago
  Then they have a problem (legal, economical, practical). They shouldn't make that problem their employees' problem though. Solutions include stopping moderation, or suspending operations partially or completely. For example, if they prevented image sending/posting for a few months, their moderation workload would likely be lower.
makomk 6y ago
The fundamental nature of moderation on something like Facebook means that moderators have access to a lot of sensitive, personal information and images. If they let moderators take that information home they basically lose any control or ability to stop them from copying it.
- hunter2_ 6y ago
  If the issue is visually surveiling employees and their computers, can't that be solved for remote work by issuing every employee a camera and tripod to be situated over their shoulder, remotely monitored by whoever was physically monitoring employees on site? If the video feed goes dark, the surveillance operator could trigger a forced shutdown of their laptop (or even better, disconnect their RDP/VDI/etc. session).
  - richthegeek 6y ago
    Read up on the psychological problems of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon People are very psychologically affected when they feel they are being constantly observed, especially when that observation is only for punishment. There's a story from an Amazon warehouse recently where a guy had a heart attack and didn't get found for 20 minutes. A few days prior he had put something back in the wrong place and management came to him in 2 minutes. Do you think Facebook overseers would be any different?
- CaptainZapp 6y ago
  I'm working for a global financial institution in a country, which takes banking secrecy very seriously (such as in criminal offense and jail time seriously). Within two weeks all employees, which weren't not needed at the front line or personally in an office were moved to home office. The company was able to move 10s of thousands of employees in a couple weeks securely and reliably (safe for a few glitches, which are to be expected on that scale). There are reliable solutions to completely segregate what's happening on corporate systems from a simple, employee owned laptop connected from home. Sure, you can make pictures of the screen, but you can do that in the office too. Then again you can just print it, while at the office. Something which you can't do at home. So no, I don't really buy this reasoning for a company fancying itself totally hi-tech.

delroth 6y ago

My understanding is that there are certain legal requirements associated with content moderators who may have to review illegal content, especially around child abuse / sexual imagery. This is what I've been told in the past by friends in other companies working on content moderation -- I don't have any specific evidence for or against it, but it passes the smell test. The whole thing in the article about Facebook suddenly trying to automate this part of the content moderation job seems to also point in that direction. > Management told moderators that we should no longer see certain varieties of toxic content coming up in the review tool from which we work— such as graphic violence or child abuse, for example.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
sleepybrett 6y ago
If they are forced to be in the office then the office should be as covid safe as possible. I imagine these content moderators work in something akin to a facebookized phone bank 'pit'. Given that no other facebook employees are being forced to work in their expansive offices perhaps the content moderators, if they are required to work on site for security purposes, should be given the run of the empty space. That way they can easily social distance appropriately.
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  Lots of space to do the work does seem like the most reasonable, and obvious, solution to the problem.
bilbo0s 6y ago
The thing is, what if something slips through? My principle concern would be, no matter the employment relationship, you can't contract away criminal liability. (At least, not in the US.) So here you opened something while working from home, that maybe your state's child sex trafficking task force was tracking. It could just get messy. I'm not sure I would even want to do that kind of work from home.
- conductr 6y ago
  Isn’t being on a company laptop and VPN enough to equate you being “at work”? In healthcare, totally different but highly regulated, we can let people work from home with HIPAA protected info by securing the way they work and access the info.
  - hunter2_ 6y ago
    Not an expert, but I can imagine that a VPN and company laptop doesn't matter in the least when it comes down to Facebook sending certain material to employees, a legal battle coming of it, and the transmission occurring within vs. across state lines. There must be some solution though, like requiring that the VPN connection originate from an address considered to be in the same state.
    - CaptainZapp 6y ago
      Given that some US states are so fucking crazy to brand a 15 year old, who sends a sext of herself as a kiddie pornographer and a sex offender for life you may be on to something here. It seems ridiculous, but very possible. That doesn't excuse Facebook's despicable treatment of their contractors who have to wade through that filth.
alkonaut 6y ago
Then they have a problem (legal, economical, practical). They shouldn't make that problem their employees' problem though. Solutions include stopping moderation, or suspending operations partially or completely. For example, if they prevented image sending/posting for a few months, their moderation workload would likely be lower.

makomk 6y ago

The fundamental nature of moderation on something like Facebook means that moderators have access to a lot of sensitive, personal information and images. If they let moderators take that information home they basically lose any control or ability to stop them from copying it.

hunter2_ 6y ago
If the issue is visually surveiling employees and their computers, can't that be solved for remote work by issuing every employee a camera and tripod to be situated over their shoulder, remotely monitored by whoever was physically monitoring employees on site? If the video feed goes dark, the surveillance operator could trigger a forced shutdown of their laptop (or even better, disconnect their RDP/VDI/etc. session).
- richthegeek 6y ago
  Read up on the psychological problems of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon People are very psychologically affected when they feel they are being constantly observed, especially when that observation is only for punishment. There's a story from an Amazon warehouse recently where a guy had a heart attack and didn't get found for 20 minutes. A few days prior he had put something back in the wrong place and management came to him in 2 minutes. Do you think Facebook overseers would be any different?
CaptainZapp 6y ago
I'm working for a global financial institution in a country, which takes banking secrecy very seriously (such as in criminal offense and jail time seriously). Within two weeks all employees, which weren't not needed at the front line or personally in an office were moved to home office. The company was able to move 10s of thousands of employees in a couple weeks securely and reliably (safe for a few glitches, which are to be expected on that scale). There are reliable solutions to completely segregate what's happening on corporate systems from a simple, employee owned laptop connected from home. Sure, you can make pictures of the screen, but you can do that in the office too. Then again you can just print it, while at the office. Something which you can't do at home. So no, I don't really buy this reasoning for a company fancying itself totally hi-tech.