Tag Archive for: employer

Managing Remote Work: 7 Tips for Creating Effective Employer Policies | Fisher Phillips

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The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in unprecedented change for the workplace after stay-at-home orders, isolation and quarantine requirements, and accommodation requests resulted in many employees temporarily working from home. Employers and employees alike recognized certain benefits of remote work arrangements, which led many business leaders to explore hybrid and permanent remote work policies. While remote work arrangements are not practical for every job or desired by every employer, when such arrangements are embraced and become embedded into company policy, employers need to ensure they are taking proper precautions. Below are seven tips that employers should consider when implementing remote work policies.

  1. Create a Written Remote Work Policy

    You should consider creating a written policy establishing the criteria and guidelines for working remotely. Will all employees and roles be eligible? Identify the roles that are critical to your business operations and determine whether those individuals can carry out their jobs while working remotely. Set performance standards and expectations from the start, and include policies on security and data protection, safety, and expectations about equipment and materials.

  2. Review Rules on Expense Reimbursement

    Be sure that your pay practices for all employees – those who work onsite and those who work remotely – comply with the applicable federal and state wage and hour laws. In some states, such as California, employers must ensure all business expenses that are “reasonable” and “necessary” to perform the job remotely are reimbursed. At least ten states – California, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, New York, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, and South Dakota − and the District of Columbia have enacted laws requiring employers to reimburse employees for certain remote work expenses.

    Even if the applicable state does not require reimbursement, failure to reimburse could lead to allegations of federal wage and hour violations for those paid at or near the minimum wage. For example, under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), employers generally don’t have to reimburse employees for work-related…

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Is your employer watching you? Demand for employee surveillance software skyrockets

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This is the weekly Careers newsletter. If you’re reading this on the web or someone forwarded this e-mail newsletter to you, you can sign up for Globe Careers and all Globe newsletters here.

Déjà Leonard is a copywriter and freelance journalist based in Calgary.

You log in to your work computer, coffee in hand, sweatpants on, ready to work. It’s just you, your tasks for the day and anyone else you might share a living space with – or is it?

According to a recent report from top10vpn.com, an internet security firm that reviews VPN services, the demand for employee surveillance software is up 59 per cent since the pandemic started.

While this may seem sinister to some, and unsurprising to others, the uptick in interest isn’t completely unwarranted. One study reveals that eight in 10 remote workers in the U.S. admit to slacking off during work hours, and more than 43 per cent admitted to visiting pornographic websites on their laptops.

The problem with surveillance software

“The rapid rise of such invasive software risks setting new standards of workplace surveillance and dramatically undermining employees’ right to privacy,” the top10vpn report states.

While privacy is a concern, when you dig deeper, the more prominent issue for both employers and employees may be withdrawal.

Research from behavioural Scientist suggests that when people know they are being monitored, the breakdown in trust can lead to disengagement, which ultimately, and somewhat ironically, leads to even less productivity.

The report shows two of the most popular software for monitoring employees included Hubstaff and FlexiSPY. Here’s a quick look at some of the features of these software.

Hubstaff
  • Screen monitoring
  • Keystroke logging (recording the keys struck on a keyboard)
  • Location tracking
  • Time tracking
FlexiSPY

Everything Hubstaff can do, plus:

  • Remote-control take over
  • Call tapping
  • Webcam surveillance
  • Instant messaging (IM) monitoring

How governments and people are taking action

In Canada, governments are starting to look at the issue. Recently, Ontario became the first province to require companies with more than 25 employees to disclose if and how they are being monitored electronically including through…

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Healthcare Highlights: Cyber-Security, Licensing Board Issues, and Employer COVID-19 Regulations | Ward and Smith, P.A.

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Recently, several Ward and Smith attorneys held a Health Care Breakfast and Learn to provide insights on the healthcare industry relevant to their specific areas of expertise, from privacy and data security to professional licensing issues and, labor and employment.

Privacy and Data Security

Peter McClelland, a privacy, data security, and technology attorney who is also a Certified Information Privacy Professional, began the discussion with some trends and tips for healthcare providers to be aware of in regards to cybersecurity.

“Healthcare and financial services are always neck and neck each year for which industry in the United States gets targeted the most by malicious cyber actors,” said McClelland.

In the world of data security, there are three major trends that have been especially relevant to healthcare providers over the past few years:

  • Substantial increase in cyberattacks – malicious actors using trusted third parties or managed service providers to gain access to computer systems and personal information
  • Significant uptick in the sophistication of cyberattacks – phishing schemes, tiny changes in email addresses, and spoofed email accounts increasingly difficult to identify
  • Increased costs associated with successful attacks – average cost for a data breach in 2020 was around $4 million

Outside of the healthcare industry, an attack on a managed service provider, service partner, or supplier is typically referred to as a supply chain attack. These supply chain attacks are the ones that have made headlines in recent years, with companies such as Colonial Pipeline, Microsoft, and Cassia experiencing significant costs to their finances and brand reputation.

“When you read or hear about any of these things in the news, it can be easy to think that events are only tangentially relevant to you,” explains McClelland, “but the same techniques in all of those get repurposed against entities in the healthcare space every day, whether they make headlines or not.”

McClelland reported that phishing scams in prior years almost seemed to be deliberately obvious in terms of sophistication. Formerly, the most advanced phishing and ransomware technology was mostly just available to…

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Systems Admin Arrested for Hacking Former Employer

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The former systems administrator of an American department store has been arrested after allegedly hacking into his ex-employer’s private network to give his former colleagues paid holidays. 

New Yorker Hector Navarro is accused of creating a “superuser” account that allowed him to access a computer system of Century 21 after he resigned from his position at the company.

Navarro worked as a human resources systems administrator at the Manhattan branch of the department store from 2012 to October 2019. Through his role, the defendant had access to the company’s data management and timekeeping system. 

The 30-year-old is accused of accessing a network of his former employer from his Brooklyn apartment to tamper with data. It is further alleged that Navarro deleted data to prevent consultants hired to replace him from accessing Century 21’s computer network.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office stated: “Prior to his last day, he stole employee data from the company and created an unauthorized ‘superuser’ account on the company’s network—which allowed him access to the network after his resignation.” 

The department store discovered the security breach after Navarro’s replacements were unable to get into the system. An investigation by the company determined that changes had been made to Century 21’s holiday payroll policy.

As a result of the changes, certain employees would have been paid for holidays even if they had not worked on those particular dates. Century 21 spent thousands of dollars to correct the changes and deletions allegedly made by Navarro. 

“If left undetected, this former employee’s alleged tampering could have cost Century 21 more than $50,000,” said District Attorney Cy Vance.

“Unauthorized access to computer networks and the theft of valuable proprietary data are serious threats to the Manhattan business community.”

A New York Supreme Court indictment has charged Navarro with attempted grand larceny in the second degree, criminal mischief in the second degree, computer tampering in the third degree, computer trespass, petit larceny, and the criminal possession of stolen property.

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