Effective Employee Internet Monitoring
Many entrepreneurs are in a position to confront the employee about their Internet use. The work not related activities including online games, Internet shopping, stock trading, Internet radio, MP3 streaming and downloads are the new temptations in the workplace.
If an employee is connected to the Internet your activities in these four threats:
- Threats to productivity: only 20 minutes of recreational navigating a day can a company with 30 employees costs about $ 1,000 per week ($ 25 per hour per employee)
- Legal risk: employees can sue if you are not a workplace free of harassment, which offers women and minorities. This means taking reasonable care to block offensive web content.
- Network Threats: An employee can bring your network to crash into simply wrong on the site. Other recreational activities such as surfing and downloading MP3 files can be drawn from the useful bandwidth of critical business needs.
- Security threats: viruses enter networks through a variety of sources, such as Web-based e-mail, instant messaging, file transfer, e-mail attachments or other files directly downloaded from a website.
Companies of all sizes should take effective e-mail, instant messaging and Web traffic logs into their overall strategy of managing documents. Some businesses need to do this to industry regulation such as Sarbanes-Oxley, Gramm-Leach-Bliley and HIPAA.
The first step is to make the types of content on the Internet, do not choose to be admitted into the workplace. Note that all employees have the same privileges, it is important to the solution of network management you choose, be adapted to a flexible configuration to suit your needs.
There are two main types of monitoring solutions, Internet gateway and desktop solutions. Gateway solutions are software or hardware as a checkpoint for all Internet traffic on the network. Office solutions are based on the local computer installed to enforce the Internet Policy, before the request leaves the machine. Office solutions, very good for small networks and gateway solutions work on both.
The next step is to create an official policy of the company specifically for Internet use. It should all Internet activities, not just those you want to manage. Remember, the document can not account for all possible scenarios on the Internet, it is important to use a broad discussion of concrete examples. Is, for example, instead of the claim are “political, not posted to newsgroups, you may want to” News from the corporate network or the other company may use assets held no political views. “The second movement is much stronger because it does not specify a message or a delivery system. If you purchase insurance, then be sure to get their approval on all materials. In some cases, they have provisions further that directly relate to your industry.
The most difficult step is implementing the new policy. In most cases, some or all users, a reduction of Internet privileges. Prepare for a temporary increase in demand for support, some users can not access certain content related work. Internet configuration policy is an ongoing process that must be maintained regularly.
Soon the complaints of users will not go back and production is back to normal. It is important to update the filtering software regularly and keep a log of Internet activity. When the time comes when you confront an employee about their Internet use, you have proof of their Internet activities and a detailed comparison with their peers. This is a case to say much more than “I saw you look 10 times ….”
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