Woman Fired by Keystroke Technology: Big Brother at the Work-From-Home Keyboard

Aside from being able to work in pajamas at home, cases like being fired as your employer secretly spy on you by monitoring every keystroke you make are imaginable. You see, it sounds more or less like a scene from a science fiction movie. However, this dramatic situation became possible for Suzie Cheikho – an Australian woman who lost her 18-year job trying to protect herself from her company’s “keystroke technology. ”

What is Keystroke Technology?

Consider it computer espionage, only instead of infiltrating personal computers, you are invading the work’s computer system. This software captures every keystroke you type they offers a detailed report of your working keyboard activity. It is not hard to imagine how frequently they type, how they type, and the time they are away from the keyboard. Using this, the company of Suzie sought to set a low keystroke count on her as a sign that she was not working as expected.

Low-Case Keys: Was this worker fired for not typing enough?

Suzie said his keystroke data made her feel that the data collected were not a true representation of the work she does. Perhaps she was thinking of ideas at work by stepping out to discuss something with her colleagues on the phone, or maybe she was using an application that typed her ideas instead of physically typing them. Though, she tried to convince him, her employer never believed in her ability. He said they fired her, which led to talk of privacy and decency issues in the remote working environment.

Is This Legal?

Whether or not it is legal to perform keystroke monitoring largely depends on the particular geographical location of the person being spied on. In some countries, specific legislation dictates that an employer should seek permission from an employee before implementing such software. But even in cases where the consent of the minor was given, people still tend to ask questions. In light of the above argument, it can be easily deduced that the number of keystrokes does not accurately represent a person’s productivity. Can it explain the nature of work in today’s environment?

Beyond the Keystrokes: Trust is perhaps one of the foundations of any relationship and once it is broken, it is well nigh impossible to regain it.

Suzie's case highlights a bigger issue: dues to the difficulties in developing mutual trust between employers and employees. It is thus significant to note that when companies opt for such intense observation measures, it yields a kind of scrutiny that elicits a sense of being closely observed and evaluated. This can demoralize people, stifle creativity and indeed, output in the workforce.

The Future of Work: Balancing the Controlling of C’s

Of course, many benefits of working from home in terms of comfort and flexibility are unprecedented in comparison to what is offered in modern offices and other forms of business, yet, all these comforts take their toll in one or another way, implying such challenges as the lack of clear definition of goals and objectives in advance.  Today’s Managers are duty-bound to establish how to ensure performance is as fairly and as efficiently measured without overstepping the subordinates’ space.

Suzie’s experience is a clear indication of the various unwanted incidents any young woman is subjected to.  It is such an expectation that we will be geared and eager to begin speaking about our vision of how we wish to practice in the age of the digital.  Considering our employers are already keeping an eye on our activities mostly through disapprovals and/or angry outbursts, should they be monitoring ‘what we are typing’? Thus, the general course of the trends revealed by the tendencies that shape the future of work may be described as an action aimed at establishing the line between trust and productivity, without a doubt, these tasks are realized within the framework of the trends based on the right to privacy.