privacy

[agabriel at home.tzo.org (Anthony J. Gabrielson)]

This is the angle that I had been thinking of.

Anthony

On Mon, 10 Dec 2001, Kyle Plummer wrote:

> Hi everyone,
> 
> I'd like to add.  There are some companies that use your first login of the
> day like a time clock.  If you start at 8:00, why are you logging in at
> 8:15?  A crued timekeeper I know, but an indicator none the less.  Companies
> needed to set policies for access, and security.  The issues are not if you
> are playing Quake for 8 hours, but are you trading company secrets on the
> Net.  Some companies do encourage downtime like game playing to help with
> creativity.  But, are you searching the Net for the company, or to expand
> your portfolio.  If a company has a tight clamp on access.  It's because of
> a serious problem in the past, not because of some horror story in the news.
> Security is an issue when you look at MS Win workplaces.  You need to screen
> for viruses, and spam. ;-)  Most exploits come from within a company.
> Seeing what others are making.  Looking in on someones research.  Hopefully
> your job as a Net. Admin. is not on the line should something like this
> happen.
> 
> Kyle
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "will" <willg at bluesock.org>
> To: "Jerry Feldman" <gaf at blu.org>
> Cc: <discuss at blu.org>
> Sent: Monday, December 10, 2001 2:15 PM
> Subject: Re: privacy
> 
> 
> >
> > My experience is that large companies (talking multiple sites with
> > hundreds if not thousands of employees) tend to see Internet usage as a
> > waste of employee time and employ fascist measures to reduce Internet
> > usage.  There may be members of the company that are comfortable with the
> > Internet--and even see the Internet as a very useful resource for speeding
> > up work, but the company generally frowns on such things.  The Internet is
> > scary to these people.
> >
> > On the flip side, I think this is mostly relegated to large companies and
> > companies with a significant portion of older manager folks who haven't
> > gotten their hands around the Internet yet.
> >
> > All the contracting gigs I've done so far have looked the other way in
> > terms of Internet/network usage.  One company only complained after one of
> > my co-workers built a server with 20 GB of mp3's and installed Shoutcast
> > on it which a good portion of us listened to all day--they said we were
> > producing so much network traffic that we were affecting access to their
> > mainframe.  Oops....
> >
> > On the flip flip side, I own part of a company that specializes in email
> > issues for litigation.  My advice to you folks is don't use email for
> > anything exciting.  It will definitely come back to haunt you.  Course, it
> > may help you greatly--depending on which side of the "we got screwed" line
> > you're on.  Following that thought, it's very possible that companies are
> > increasing their Internet resource usage policies in order to reduce risk
> > to themselves.
> >
> > Thoughts?
> > /will
> >
> >
> > On Mon, 10 Dec 2001, Jerry Feldman wrote:
> >
> > > Many companies do look closely at people's Internet usage. During a
> previuous contract at a
> > > certain defense contractor, I know one Unix admin who was fired based on
> his use of the Internet.
> > > Even when one ran telnet, the telnet proxy came up with a warning that
> this was to be used for
> > > company business only.....
> > >
> > > Additionally, I was supposed to be writing device drivers. I was denied
> root privs on the
> > > workstation I was using to write the device drivers (as were employees).
> After 6 weeks of
> > > haranguing the IT people, they relented, but then went to security. The
> rule was that I could have
> > > root priv, but only when an emplyee was watching my keystrokes.
> > > I left at the end of my contract eventhough this could have been a long
> term deal wich also paid
> > > relatively well. Too restrictive and too much crap. Another company
> which also did government
> > > contracts complained about my email volumes, since I did get a lot of
> bounces from majordomo.
> > > On 10 Dec 2001 at 9:39, Adam Russell wrote:
> > >
> > > > Date: Sun, 9 Dec 2001 10:05:56 -0500 (EST)
> > > > >From: "Anthony J. Gabrielson"  <agabriel at home.tzo.org>
> > > > >To: Dan Geer  <geer at world.std.com>
> > > > >Cc: discuss at blu.org
> > > > >Subject: Re: privacy -
> > > >
> > > > >I expect it at work - that doesn't bother me.  My home home machine
> >w\o
> > > > >knowing it, would bother me.
> > > >      Errrr.......where exactly do you work? I for one would be pretty
> surprised if *my* employer were log my every keystroke. Then again, I don't
> work with money or nuclear secrets. But even so, I would be willing to bet
> on more clever checks to my honesty than blindly recording *everything* I
> > > would do.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > > > PS: You should check out this great new site that I found. They've got
> free
> > > > movies, music, email. It's really great! http://www.netbroadcaster.com
> > > > _______________________________________________
> > > > Discuss mailing list
> > > > Discuss at blu.org
> > > > http://www.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> > >
> > > Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
> > > Associate Director
> > > Boston Linux and Unix user group
> > > http://www.blu.org
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Discuss mailing list
> > > Discuss at blu.org
> > > http://www.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> > >
> >
> > --
> > whatever it is, you can find it at http://www.bluesock.org/~willg/
> > except Will--you can only see him in real life.
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Discuss mailing list
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> > http://www.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> 
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