Rlc... Holy Crap!!!

[Don Corleone]

So, I'm at work today, and I work at a small design center for a large company. We have the unusual attribute of watching typical corporate culture, but with pipeline delay... most times you can literally see it coming.

Not so in this case. Our one and only local IT guy (who, in an engineering firm is responsible for running simulators and modelling on top of who can get to ESPN.com for their fantasy draft), very kind, very affable Indian guy uses the intercom for AFAIK the first time...

"Atttention. Attention please... I need to see AAA (the design center manager) and BBB (an employee) in my office immediately please".

Well, the 2 went in, the doors shut, and 2 hours later, BBB walked out looking as though he'd been crying. AAA looked enraged (and he's actually usually pretty cool), stormed back to his own office, and slammed the door. Security from our nearest large office arrived an hour later to escort BBB out. So, by lunch, we're going nuts with curiosity. We grab IT guy, buy him lunch, and then force him to tell us what's up.

Apparently, BBB was logging into RedlightCenter at work. We were all clueless (a good sign, by the way). So he gets really embarrassed and says he can't talk about it. We poke some more... apparently there's an online environment for shacking up! And mind you, my old friend and former co-worker BBB is not only married, he brought his kids to the barbecue this year. And his wife doesn't strike me as the 'live and let live type", she's actually pretty stern.

So question... BBB is either going away for 'counselling' for a very long time, or possibly fired (can't get an answer). Fair?

And we almost had a betting pool going on whether AAA would let BBB's wife know and if so, what would be the reaction. What do you think?

[Marshal Murat]

If BBB is a dependable kinda guy, and AAA likes him, then AAA will not tell the wife. If AAA has a bone to pick, then he will tell the wife, but I would think that AAA would get angry at BBB not the wife.

[Whacker]

IIRC there are privacy laws that would prevent AAA from telling BBB's wife/family about this, even if they are friends outside of work. Also Don, did he admit to actually hooking up with other people via that site? Or was he just looking around?

Ironically this is one of the arguments against employer "Big Brotherism" in terms of network traffic and computer use when at work. Lawsuits have been flying around about this since day one, and while I don't know anything about win/loss trends or any big legal precedents that have been set, I do know that lawsuits in general are always expensive, esp. for employers who are trying to turn out a profit (even if they win). This is exactly the reason that my employer does not do this.

[KukriKhan]

So, is the question to the Backroom: can knowledge of personal activity gained by workplace monitoring ethical, and actionable?

Or something else?

What is Rlc?

p.s. if it were my company, the first guy fired would be IT guy for caving in to fellow employees over lunch.

[Whacker]

So, is the question to the Backroom: can knowledge of personal activity gained by workplace monitoring ethical, and actionable?

Ermm.. What exactly is the question again?

I'll take a swag at it though. On one hand we have the employer, who should have a reasonable expectation that when they are paying someone for their time to do work, then they should actually be working (most of the time). On the other hand, we have the employee, who should have a right to some levels of privacy and an expectation that his employer is not always looking over his shoulder and allowing him to do his job like a big boy. "On the clock" is a grey term that's highly debateable in my view, esp. for salaried office-type positions.

I guess my thought is that stuff like this, monitoring usage of resources to this level, is probably going a bit too far. If an employee is suspected of slacking off at work, then it'll show up in his results when the performance reviews come around. There are established HR processes for dealing with occurances like this. Now that's just thinking about random browsing of sites on a PC (even porn maybe), and stuff like using the company phone excessively for personal long distance.

The sticky areas that we've had to deal with are things like sexual harassment (female coworker walks in on male coworker looking a gianthooters.com, etc), and stalking/harassment/death threats and the like. My personal feeling is that the employer should not be accountable for the employee doing things like this at all, but I don't know what the law really states on this matter and how much if at all the employer could be held accountable.



Also, another thought I had. Even IF the employer has been monitoring BBB's computer usage, I don't believe they can even ask him anything about what he's been doing except to establish that he HAS be visiting the site, which I'm guessing is in direct violation of company/HR policy, business conduct guidelines, and/or his employment contract.

[Ronin]

BBB should be reprimanded for using company time and equipment for such ends....there´s no need to fire him tough....I´d consider that if BBB repeated the behavior...

AAA has no business telling anyone about what BBB was doing.

This could all have been prevented if the employer invested on some simple site-blocking software.

[English assassin]

Hmm, personal use of the internet at work, finally, a topic the backroom can take a close personal interest in...

I'm assuming this site wasn't teh pron, more a sort of Org with extras. Although presumably the extras have to be advertised in some way which might contravene any workplace policy on internet use.

On that basis I don't think he should have been treated any differently to if he was logging onto Amazon. Which may or may not be sackable, depending on what your workplace policy is.

Insight from my employment law colleagues: employers are actually quite happy about creative uncertainty over internet use. Everything ticks along quite happily, (provided you avoid teh pron, which is always instant death), but, if they have any reason to want to get rid of someone, they check out their internet use. Chances are you'll find plenty of personal stuff, which, hey presto, can be turneed into a reason to dismiss, or at least used as a bargaining tool in the exit negotiations.

Conversely, keep your billings up, and visits to the org will not be commented on.

Gosh, I live in an evil world.

As for AAA, as a rule I agree he has no business grassing BBB to his wife. He doesn't have to lie, since that would make him a co-conspirator, so if she asks him direct why BBB was sacked he should tell her. Also if he was a friend of the wife in her own right he might tell her, although that is tricky. Very tricky. I think I would still keep schtum in that case, but I can see an argument for telling her.

As a general rule I think a marriage is no one's business except those who are in it.

[King Kurt]

Don - far more important is.... because the IT man was doing a bit of snooping, were people able to get to ESPN.com for their fantasy draft info???

I mean, if, due to his interest in evesdropping on cyber horizontal jogging, people couldn't get their vital draft info then that is serious!!!!!!!!

- I mean, doesn't he know that the football season starts in September - that is only 5-6 weeks away. It is well known that the main reason for going to work is to use the extensive investigative power of the internet to prepare the most perfect fantasy team. Fortunately we do not have such restrictive practices here in the UK, the home of the free - my team drafted overnight (second league for football, I'm also running 5 baseball teams) and I'm kinder smug having Peyton Manning and Drew Bees as my 2 starting QBs.

[Husar]

What is Rlc?

I would guess RedlightCenter from Don's post

I'm assuming this site wasn't teh pron, more a sort of Org with extras.

RedlightCenter doesn't really sound like that.
And no, I'm not going to have a look to verify that.

[Sigurd]

I take it this IT guy is the administrator of your network...
Why the !!!! has he not implemented any adult filters on the network?
If people want a piece of tail, they should be forced to to this in their own private home. Nearly every company of some size have this implemented.

Take the network I am sitting on... sometimes I am unlucky and click on the banner at the bottom of this site.
There is one special banner that gives this warning:



This means it got logged somewhere in the system that I tried to access an adult site...
Should I worry? Probably not since the filter is in place.

On a side note... should this particular banner even be displayed on the .org in the first place, considering its adult content policy?

[Don Corleone]

RLC stands for RedlightCenter, and yes, the firewalls should have blocked access.

I went and checked it out last night (apparently a lot of my coworkers did) and RLC is an online environment dedicated to meeting people to have 'virtual relations' with. Apparently,BBB had found some way around the security system. The word this morning though is that he won't be getting fired. He will be attending some classes and he will be getting a written warning put in his file though.

My questions to the Org were along the lines of:

-Is using the internet on company time theft? (And therefore, aren't those of us with jobs hypocrites?)

-Does the sexual nature of the site BBB was going to make it worse?

-Because he's essentially cheating on her while at work, should his wife be told.

All I have to say is at work, at home or on the moon, if Mrs Corleone caught me hanging around places like that, we'd be adding a whole new dimension to Lemur's stream of snip threads:

And I find it interesting (really, I do, that's not said as a veiled criticism) that Kurki's first reaction was the IT guy being guilty of violating the trust of his position for telling us about it. You have a point there...

[Seamus Fermanagh]

-Is using the internet on company time theft? (And therefore, aren't those of us with jobs hypocrites?)

-Does the sexual nature of the site BBB was going to make it worse?

-Because he's essentially cheating on her while at work, should his wife be told.

All I have to say is at work, at home or on the moon, if Mrs Corleone caught me hanging around places like that, we'd be adding a whole new dimension to Lemur's stream of snip threads:

And I find it interesting (really, I do, that's not said as a veiled criticism) that Kurki's first reaction was the IT guy being guilty of violating the trust of his position for telling us about it. You have a point there...

Yes, assuming the company does not specifically permit such use as a "fringe benefit," it can be classified as theft.

Of itself, no -- at least from the perspective of the business. Somebody spending 6 hours planning their Travelocity vacation is just as much in the wrong. Mrs. BBB may evaluate the situation using a different rubric.

My wife would also be somewhat less than "amused." Unfortunately for me, she really did write a course on proper use/care of an semi-automatic pistol.

KK makes a valid point about your IT guy. BBB committed a fireable offense by stealing net time for unauthorized purposes, not working at what he is employed to do for that time, and for adding to the security risk associated with net operations. This kind of offense is potentially serious, but one that is commonly given one "warning" reprimand if the employee in question is otherwise a good contributor. The IT guy committed a fireable offense that could generate millions of dollars of lawsuit damages levied against your company and bankrupt it -- and BBB's case would be so open and shut that the PI attorneys would do "best outa three falls" wrestling to get it.

[English assassin]

RLC is an online environment dedicated to meeting people to 'virtual relations' with.

It IS just like the Org then

At risk of derailing the thread (but it is just about relevant) in matrimonial terms has he crossed the line (I say yes) and where is the line (not sure).

There's a spectrum, isn't there, from choosing Underworld as your saturday night DVD (which happens to feature Kate Beckinsale as a leather clad vampire and I am sorry, but no reasonable wife can expect her husband not to find that a plus point,) through admiring the babe thread, onto admiring err, other material not allowed on the babe thread, and all the way on to ending with installing the barmaid from your local in a flat (This last is a bad idea. If it all goes wrong you will have to start drinking in another pub. )

Personally, although I think its rather tacky, I'd say there was less harm in the RLC nonsense than, say, some Molder and Scully real life buddy relationship that reeks with UST, but where nothing quite gets round to happening. I mean, no one is going to leave their wives for virtual relations with someone calling themselves Devastating Davina. Are they?

I still say no one has the right to tell his wife, although equally no one has to cover for him.

[KukriKhan]

On a side note... should this particular banner even be displayed on the .org in the first place, considering its adult content policy?

To clarify: the Org doesn't pick the ads, the host does - and we suspect that they make deals with more 'local' ad providers, so that while Ser Clegane, for example, might see a Siemens ad in Germany, Kukri in California could be presented an ad for Sea World, at the same time. In the forums, we place the ad (having it is mandatory) out of general view, at the bottom of the page, to prevent (or lessen) accidental clicks.

Our apologies if one of the ads rings the bells of netnannies. We do want to know about that, though, so we can report it to the host, who know that we have workplace surfers/visitors. Screenshots are encouraged.

Sorry for the interruption. Just needed to answer that important question.

Please carry on.

[HoreTore]

To clarify: the Org doesn't pick the ads, the host does - and we suspect that they make deals with more 'local' ad providers, so that while Ser Clegane, for example, might see a Siemens ad in Germany, Kukri in California could be presented an ad for Sea World, at the same time.

The ultimate reason why Norway is the best place to live: You get fish, we get porn!!

[doc_bean]

My questions to the Org were along the lines of:

-Is using the internet on company time theft? (And therefore, aren't those of us with jobs hypocrites?)

Depends on a lot of things. If he is payed based on performance or work done than generally I'd say no, this would apply to most 'lower' management functions and up. If he does his job like he's supposed to there's little reason to complain.
Second: corporate culture: are people allowed to have private phone calls ? If so than private use of the internet should be allowed.

-Does the sexual nature of the site BBB was going to make it worse?

It shouldn't, unless it can in some way damage the reputation of a company (I know one person who mailed me on company time, using the company account, who was so rude I nearly sent an email to HR complaining about her behaviour, if I had I fully expected her to be reprimanded. She was lucky I'm the forgivalbe type... )

-Because he's essentially cheating on her while at work, should his wife be told.

Hell no. It's questionable whether or not monitoring his activities isn't already a (grave) intrusion of privacy. Telling his wife definately crossing the line.

All I have to say is at work, at home or on the moon, if Mrs Corleone caught me hanging around places like that, we'd be adding a whole new dimension to Lemur's stream of snip threads:

Still you went to check it out for yourself ? Did you ask for permission ?

And I find it interesting (really, I do, that's not said as a veiled criticism) that Kurki's first reaction was the IT guy being guilty of violating the trust of his position for telling us about it. You have a point there...

That's actually the biggest issue. You guys really shouldn't have pushed him...

[Husar]

To clarify: the Org doesn't pick the ads, the host does - and we suspect that they make deals with more 'local' ad providers, so that while Ser Clegane, for example, might see a Siemens ad in Germany, Kukri in California could be presented an ad for Sea World, at the same time. In the forums, we place the ad (having it is mandatory) out of general view, at the bottom of the page, to prevent (or lessen) accidental clicks.

I could swear those legs are from Angelina Jolie...
Oh, and I clicked on the Foxy Fans ad...
My point? None of these is a german ad, I think they're all american/international, at least for me.

There's a spectrum, isn't there, from choosing Underworld as your saturday night DVD (which happens to feature Kate Beckinsale as a leather clad vampire and I am sorry, but no reasonable wife can expect her husband not to find that a plus point,)

through admiring the babe thread, onto admiring err, other material not allowed on the babe thread,

The babe thread is borderline between what I'd call "admiring the female beauty" and "looking at private regions of girls to get aroused", the first is like admiring arts in a museum while the latter involves too much visible foreign privacy to be accepted. Now that is my personal opinion as a single, but one could say these are the guidelines I'd try to adhere to should I ever stop being a single(though I personally do it now anyway). If a partner gets angry because you watch Kate Beckinsale in hot leather suits in an action movie, then she shouldn't watch any movies with good-looking guys either.
I know it doesn't usually work that way, but one can, dream, no?

[Ser Clegane]

-Is using the internet on company time theft? (And therefore, aren't those of us with jobs hypocrites?)

That depends IMO - personally I am doing quite some (unpaid) overtime, so I do not consider a bit of private internet usage at work to be time theft as long as I get my job done properly.

-Does the sexual nature of the site BBB was going to make it worse?

Actually I do not think that it makes much of a difference (for the employer) - whether I spend half an hour looking at CNN, the org or RLC should not matter, unless looking at a specific website has any other detrimental effect on the quality of my work (and I guess some heated debate on a discussion board might have as much of an effect on your concentration during the next hour as a place for "virtual relations"

-Because he's essentially cheating on her while at work, should his wife be told.

I don't think his wife should be told - the only concern of the employer should be if the activities of the employee have any negative effect on the quality of his work. If they feel that this "cheating" has a negative effect, they should only discuss this issue directly with the employee. Unless the employee is involved in illegal activities I do not see any justification to involve any other person outside the company

[drone]

I don't really know what RLC is or how it works. If it's a way to set up liaisons with other people, then BBB should probably be reprimanded for "improper use of company equipment", reminded of his family life, and that's it. If it's for virtual sex, basically the guy is pleasuring himself at work, which is probably a terminating offense.

Regardless, if I were you, I would avoid touching his keyboard.

[Sigurd]

Our apologies if one of the ads rings the bells of netnannies. We do want to know about that, though, so we can report it to the host, who know that we have workplace surfers/visitors. Screenshots are encouraged.

Sorry to hi-jack your thread Don but I think Kukri should see a screenshot of the banner in question...



Moderator edit: thanks Sigurd; you have mail. -Kukri

[Don Corleone]

Still you went to check it out for yourself ? Did you ask for permission ?

More than that, I asked for supervision, so there was no question about what I did or with whom.

That's actually the biggest issue. You guys really shouldn't have pushed him...

Yeah, I feel kinda bad today. It was really more of a locker-room camraderie thing than anything, but even so, the IT guy is acting pretty standoffish today. Well, hopefully it'll pass. Once word came that the guy wasn't getting fired, general opinion around here has been mostly agreement, that the guy didn't deserve to get fired so much as warned.

[doc_bean]

More than that, I asked for supervision, so there was no question about what I did or with whom.

Heh, guess I'll have to scratch you of my potential blackmailee list

Yeah, I feel kinda bad today. It was really more of a locker-room camraderie thing than anything, but even so, the IT guy is acting pretty standoffish today. Well, hopefully it'll pass. Once word came that the guy wasn't getting fired, general opinion around here has been mostly agreement, that the guy didn't deserve to get fired so much as warned.

In a small company things like this are to be expected, and I doubt if he'd get anything past a warning.