You seem to forget your emoployer also has rights, your rights don't trump theirs at least in the US.
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Apple Sued for 'All-Seeing Eye' Employee Device Monitoring Policy
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No it isn't but I think this is probably the first time we have seen this specific type of court complaint raised by an employee.
Employee's should be allowed to talk to other people about work place issues, provided it is done in a polite and constructive manner. No employer should be able to have it written in an employment contract that they will hire a person on the proviso that the person does not talk to anyone else about their job, their job title, their job responsibilities and any work place issues they may have because that is a kin to blackmail 'You can have the job as long as you do not disclose anything about your job position or work place issues to others'.
You can't talk about anything that is covered by an NDA, posting on social media isn't private and Harassment, treatment issues should only be discussed with your manager, HR or a Lawyer.
The allegation is that Apple is spying. It hasn’t been proven.
If you use a company device or company resources and services what you do is property of the company. It has to be thus, otherwise the company does not own your work product or have authority over its own capital. Without ownership, it cannot institute policies and procedures for internal accountability and insure all legal requirements are met.
This guy’s problem is that he was presented with a choice: Use company devices and company resources, or use his own personal ones. If personal resources are used, personal activity becomes co-mingled with company-owned activity. The only way to be able to distinguish between the two so that state, federal, and shareholder duties can be discharged is to look at everything.
Apple should require everyone use a company device to avoid this. I suspect if they did that, then people would complain about not being able to use their personal resources. Employees should never use personal devices for work purposes.
I have close relatives who work for Apple, so I have some insight to this. He wasn’t forced. He was given the option and had to sign paperwork acknowledging that if he used his personal devices that Apple would have access to his personal information. I’ve no doubt that he feels it was not fully explained to him before he made his decision. He may have even been told that “it’s okay to use your personal phone” or “just used your AppleID”. But he was given paperwork that explained everything in detail. If he didn’t read it, then I don’t think it is fair to blame Apple for his lack of diligence.
When I worked for Google, I was given this same option and I chose to use work devices for work. I didn’t even add my work email to my personal devices because I didn’t want my stuff co-mingled with theirs. That’s just asking for trouble. Yes, when I traveled for Google, I wound up carry two laptops, theirs and mine. I didn’t think it an unreasonable inconvenience to preserve my firewall.
I understand in European countries people work set hours and it may be able to distinguish between work and personal actions by time of day. The laws don’t work that way in the US for exempt employees, especially in the Silicon Valley where people will work at the office in the day and from home in the evening. It isn’t unknown for people to receive work emails throughout the night or to have a boss who will expect a response at 3am (especially in a start up).
You are smart to keep your personal and work stuff separate. That’s the policy I have tried to follow in my career also. This guy had the choice to do the same. He choose to use his personal devices and personal AppleID. He signed agreements giving Apple access to his devices.
Anyone non-anonymously posting unflattering things about where they work should expect their company will be upset with them. It is pretty hard to complain about your boss in public without giving information about the company which can be used by a competitor. If nothing else, you are telling competitors about inefficiencies in your project area and perhaps even letting them know that employees may be easily poached from that area, leading to project disruptions.
There is no proof of Draconian spying. There is only an allegation filed by an attorney.
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I know a bunch of people that work for Apple in different locations. If you don't want your personal phone under lock and key, get the business phone. Apple doesn't force you to use your personal device, but if you chose to use it for work, they lock it down. Same thing at my work place. Sensitive company info can be found on phones that aren't properly secured so they offer a work phone option.
I’m sure that means when you have designated that you are working from home. It’s a sticky wicket. If the company has no right to monitor what you do on company time then you prevent the company from discharging its duties to its shareholders and to state and federal legal authorities.
There should be no expectation of privacy in the workplace whether physical or virtual no matter what continent you work on.
Again, you don't know what you are talking about. Corporations have been found multiple times to have broken the law, knowingly or unknowingly, when it comes to work contracts. Google and other forms of search can be your friend. Literally Apple is already facing another complaint, but this is from the US NLRB for unlawful practices, including "illegal confidentiality, non-disclosure, and non-compete agreements, as well as overly broad misconduct and social media policies." Which I posted about from personal experience, as a former Apple employee, earlier. https://www.reuters.com/technology/...lace-rules-2024-10-01/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
I used to work for Apple myself, and that's not how it works. That's also not the whole complaint. Ironically, this isn't the first time, either, for Apple to face this. In October a U.S. Labor Board already made these very similar complaints about policing social media and other places NOT at work. "The National Labor Relations Board in the complaint announced late on Monday claims Apple required employees nationwide to sign illegal confidentiality, non-disclosure, and non-compete agreements and imposed overly broad misconduct and social media policies." https://www.reuters.com/technology/...lace-rules-2024-10-01/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
I wonder if it applies to people like Tim Cook, or are they allowed to keep this stuff more private? It does strike me as intrusive and even though people are saying it's 'a terms and conditions' thing, there comes a point where surveillance of this type could be seen as too controlling.
I wonder if this is just common practice in many American companies? I can't imagine a Great Britain-based company could get away with this, even if it were in the small print. I remember once asking an Apple employee something about the company, away from the shop floor when I was in an elevator (lift), and he indicated that there were microphones and cameras everywhere which picked up conversations and people's interactions. I found it a little "Black Mirror"- like, and just a bit disturbing.
Maybe it's a way to ensure that a company remains successful? I don't know.
I wonder if this is just common practice in many American companies? I can't imagine a Great Britain-based company could get away with this, even if it were in the small print. I remember once asking an Apple employee something about the company, away from the shop floor when I was in an elevator (lift), and he indicated that there were microphones and cameras everywhere which picked up conversations and people's interactions. I found it a little "Black Mirror"- like, and just a bit disturbing.
Maybe it's a way to ensure that a company remains successful? I don't know.
If there is no proof, there wouldn't be other complaints, and one by the National Labor Relations Board.
Please read what I was responding to. This post had nothing to do with guilt or not. Thanks.
Please read the link in the post and potential ways this complaint could go.
just imagine, your project gets caught up in a lawsuit, and now that device you were using for work, it becomes evidence. If it's a personal device that you were counting on trading in, well, not anymore. It may even be confiscated to preserve evidence. If you use a secondary personal device, like an older phone, and have it signed into a separate work related apple ID, well, now you've airgapped your personal from your work devices. Plus, for company work, email, texts, it's not like an older phone is going to be much of a hindrance compared to the latest and greatest.
Or hopes his work visum will stick (well it won’t, if apple fires hime he can go home… name wise india? Unless he’s born here or married with a us lady)
You have just given an incite into why the employee is doing what he is doing, well done
I think a lot of people in here probably don’t even recognize that image, or understand how irony is involved.
I'm not sure it's that as how many people are saying "Pay attention" when you're agreeing to work anywhere.
If I need some device for work (laptop, phone, etc.), my employer supplies it and can install whatever monitoring software they want. I never let my employer's IT department on ANY of my personal devices and they're restricted from accessing anything on my network at home other than the Internet.
By that analogy, Apple would say “You can leave the company OR you can leave the company after this neuralizer” and this idiot would have likely taken the latter!