Sino-Singapore Jingwei, February 18 (Tao Jinbo, Chang Tao's intern) A few days ago, the layoff of an Internet company accidentally caused public attention and controversy over the employee monitoring system.
A recent investigation by Sino-Singapore Jingwei found that "employee monitoring" has now become a business.
Some staff of relevant system service providers said that their programs can monitor employees’ network usage, such as web browsing records, chat records, etc., without being aware of it, and can also monitor the screen in real time, and even analyze employee departures. Risk, 350 yuan per installation on a computer.
The lawyer told Sino-Singapore Jingwei that although it is reasonable and reasonable for the company to use software to monitor the working conditions of its employees, it is necessary and obliged to inform the employees in advance.
If employees are unaware of the company's installation of monitoring software, using office computers or networks to process and transmit information involving personal privacy may infringe on their privacy rights.
Photo by Chang Tao, New Jingwei in the data map
"Monitoring the tendency of employees to switch jobs" sparks controversy
According to media reports, on the evening of February 11, some netizens published an employee behavior monitoring system on Weibo, and added a text saying that the system can know in advance whether employees have the intention of changing jobs, which immediately caused heated public debate.
It is understood that the monitoring system page is consistent with the product introduction page of a software "Sangfor Behavior Perception System BA" developed by A-share listed company Sangfor Technology Co., Ltd. in 2017.
According to the previous introduction on the official website of Sangfor, the "behavioral perception system" can solve "pain points" such as "what is the risk of employee turnover", "how is the situation of employee sabotage" and other "pain points". For example, the product can provide "resignation risk analysis", "work efficiency analysis" and many other It can detect employees with potential resignation risk in advance, and give the basis for determining resignation risk.
However, at present, the controversial "behavior perception system" has not been able to retrieve product introduction and publicity cases on Sangfor's official website.
On February 16, Sino-Singapore Jingwei consulted Sangfor's sales customer service as a customer. The customer service said that the company can provide services such as employee online monitoring and leakage channel management and control. This service, you must be mistaken."
However, on the same day, a business person in Sangfor said, "There is no resignation (propensity) monitoring for the time being. I don't know the specific reasons. Other services such as online behavior monitoring are normal."
In response to whether the above-mentioned "behavioral perception system" has been suspended, Sino-Singapore Jingwei called the Sangfor Secretary's Office on the 18th, and a staff member said, "We don't know, and we will not comment on this matter for the time being."
According to the Tianyancha App, in March 2018, Sangfor publicly applied for a patent titled “A method, device, equipment and storage medium for analyzing turnover intentions”. The method for analyzing employee turnover includes monitoring employees’ online behavior. , analyze the risk level of employees' turnover intention, etc.
According to the news of Jiang Wenguang, the secretary of the board of directors of Sangfor, the "Behavior Awareness System BA" is not listed recently. Work efficiency analysis and turnover intention analysis are all functions of the product. The company does not monitor whose data, it is the customer's own behavior. .
Regarding how Sangfor's products monitor employees, a Sangfor salesperson introduced to Sino-Singapore Jingwei that the relevant systems are implemented through the intranet, and there is no need to install programs on the employees' computers, "matching is performed according to the company's network environment."
Installers can still 'unwittingly' monitor employees
Sino-Singapore Jingwei noticed that selling employee monitoring systems and providing corresponding services has now become a business.
In addition to monitoring employees through the intranet, there are also some systems. Although programs need to be installed on the employees' office computers, they can still monitor employees "unwittingly".
Network Manager is a terminal security management system. The sales staff of this product told Sino-Singapore Jingwei that their software can monitor the network usage of employees, including web browsing records, chat records, real-time screen monitoring, etc., and administrators can even directly intervene in employees The chat content sent by employees is blocked, and the "inappropriate remarks" sent by employees are blocked.
"Our software operates in a transparent mode. If we don't tell our employees, they can't find out by themselves."
According to him, the network manager terminal security management software is divided into two parts: "management side" and "client side". The program is installed on the employee's computer. When the employee is using the computer, the manager can observe the network usage of all employees during working hours through the management terminal, and can also analyze the employee's turnover tendency through the algorithm that comes with the software.
Photo courtesy of respondents on the background page of the monitoring program
According to the sample diagram provided by the above-mentioned network manager staff, the software's own analysis system can classify employees' turnover intentions into three levels: high-risk, suspected, and suspicious.
If an employee submits resumes or applies for jobs while browsing the web, the system will judge them as high-risk. If they visit the recruitment website multiple times, the system will mark them as suspicious.
According to a "Function Details" sent by the staff member, the network manager divides the user monitoring function into more than 20 modules such as device control, terminal management, and network management, involving almost all online behaviors such as employee web browsing and software use. , managers can also keep evidence through screen recording.
Photo courtesy of respondents for some functions of the monitoring program
"The software is charged according to the amount of installation, 350 yuan per installation on one computer, and five units are sold. Each functional module can be purchased as a package, or it can be purchased in modules, each module is 50 yuan, and the purchase of three modules starts. No need Worrying that the number of employees exceeds the software’s capacity, we can monitor as many employees as you have,” said the above-mentioned staff member.
Lawyer: To monitor employees, it is necessary for enterprises to inform in advance
According to an experienced human resources manager who introduced to Sino-Singapore Jingwei, the phenomenon of using software to monitor employees is very common in China, especially in Internet technology companies.
In fact, this type of software has existed for more than ten years. It was originally used for traffic protection to prevent employees from watching videos or listening to songs during office hours, which would affect normal work. Later, it was more used to protect the company's confidential documents from being The leak, until now, has added things like employee turnover intention statistics.
After the controversy over "monitoring employees' tendency to switch jobs", one of the focuses of public attention is whether such monitoring systems are suspected of infringing on employees' privacy.
In this regard, Yang Baoquan, senior partner of Zhongyin Law Firm, said in an interview with Sino-Singapore Jingwei that the
monitoring system itself does not involve infringement. It is essentially a neutral tool just like a camera. Whether it constitutes infringement mainly depends on the enterprise. usage.
Especially when it comes to the collection of employees' personal information, it depends on the purpose of the employer's use, whether the company monitors whether the employee's information is used for other unreasonable purposes, and whether it exceeds the reasonable scope of application.
Yang Baoquan said that according to the relevant regulations of the Civil Code and the Provisions on Internet Security Protection Technical Measures, the company installed computer monitoring software in the workplace, and did not illegally disclose or disclose the personal information of employees to the public. The behavior within the time period is monitored, which belongs to the company's right.
At the same time, according to the relevant provisions of the "Labor Contract Law", if the company's monitoring period is during working hours, and if the monitoring area is in a public work area, the activities of employees here are naturally regarded as public activities, so the company has the right to set up cameras in the office. , and also have the right to use monitoring software to supervise the network usage of employees.
Yang Baoquan further stated that although it is reasonable and reasonable for the company to use monitoring software to monitor the working conditions of employees, it is also necessary and obligatory for the company to inform employees in advance, preferably in writing.
If employees are unaware of the company's installation of monitoring software, using office computers or networks to process and transmit information involving personal privacy may infringe on their privacy rights.
(Sino-Singapore Jingwei APP)
All rights reserved by Sino-Singapore Jingwei. Without written authorization, no unit or individual may reprint, extract or use it in other ways.
Responsible editor: Luo Kun