Hi Please help evaluate this issue topic - GRE AWA

[xavirpr]

Hi,

 

Please critique my issue response.

 

Company management should conduct routine monitoring of all employee e-mail correspondence. Such monitoring will reduce the waste of resources such as time and system capacity, as well as protect the company from lawsuits.

Write a response in which you discuss your views on the policy and explain your reasoning for the position you take. In developing and supporting your position, you should consider the possible consequences of implementing the policy and explain how these consequences shape your position.

 

In today's tech savvy world where employees of a company are interfacing with internet via company resources it becomes paramount for a company to effectively manage this interfacing properly; So as to avoid any kind of wastage or litigation. But the policy statement is all encompassing, for which i have some reservations. It puts forward a case for monitoring emails of all employees, However it does not distinguishes which type of companies should consider this policy, and this monitoring is required for employees. And secondly it believes that email is the only way resource and time wastage occurs. Hence; though i agree to the motivation of policy that some mechanism should exist to check efficient use of resources. But i am not fully convinced that objective will be met in full with email monitoring approach.

 

 

To elaborate further, Firstly policy believes that companies should monitor emails of all employee. Question comes of who all employees does the email be monitored. Because ultimately it will be employees who will be monitoring the employees emails. As a solution to it Monitoring is a job which will usually be done by employees from lower levels. So you cannot expect CEO or Presidents email to be montiored by security team. Unless there is a special authorization to do so. Doing so can easily jeopardize the company existence. Example For all of companies plans strategies, future plans discussed in emails are now wide open for scrutiny to a group of people called security team. This may contain classified information which if monitored and misused can easily leak to companies competitiors causing great damage.

 

 

 

 

 

Another question is what will monitored in email. and how much resource it will consume. It would be better suited if emails are filtered thorugh general filtering criteria rather routine reading of all emails. Which wont be efficient. Filtering criteria like email size should be some

maximum. email contents shouldnt contain some blacklisted words. If the concern is to protect from lawsuits then its better to do real time filteration than routine checks. Because routine check will alleviate the problem but it wont remove the problem.

 

 

Secondly, policy believes that email is the only way an employee can misuse his time and resources. Take example of Software industry . People have to work in their workstations all the time. Instead of working, If they are watching videos in youtube or reading newspaper , magazines full day. Or doing some other work in internet via their workstation then its a much bigger wastage of company resources.

So company should not only focus on emails it should also focus on blocking such contents which are not relevant to comapny purposes. For example in creative industry it will better suit if youtube and other video sharing sites are open. But in Software developement youtube should be blocked.Or atleast they should be allowed only if the content being seen is technical and copy righted.

 

 

Thus, I agree that its better to have some kind of check but defining the checks properly is of paramount importance. Some genric rules can be applied like download should be blocked everywhere unless its from open source site so as to avoid copyright violations. Email should be filtered on basis of blacklisted kewwords so as to avoid any kind of lawsuits. Sites should be moderated on basis of relevancy of the work the company does.

 

Thanks