Can my employer track the pages i visit?

Pretty Polly

Basically i use a laptop in work and use the internet at work for work related purposes only.
At home time i bring the laptop home and most evenings connect my Vodafone mobile dongle. I could go on boards, facebook, the dailymail/showbiz, dealpage.ie for example. Can my employer track all these pages? I accidentally discovered Google Chrome Incognito and it just made me think...:)

christmas2012

Is it a company laptop?if so they could have installed software watching what you do online..

MiniNukinfuts

Yup, they could if they wanted.

Pretty Polly

christmas2012 wrote: »

Is it a company laptop?if so they could have installed software watching what you do online..

Well its more of a organisation than a company and it is their laptop. Is there any way i could find out if they have installed software? I would normally use my own laptop but its broken. Would Incognito allow me to browse normally without being watched?

partyatmygaff

Incognito more than likely won't make any difference if they have a robust monitoring setup.

Check if your connection is being passed through a proxy. If it is, I can guarantee you it's being monitored.

Failing that, check for any unusual applications running by opening up the task manager and going to processes.

NIMAN

Stop surfing porn now though!!;)

Mance Rayder

yes

CiaranC

I very much doubt your IT department are interested in what you browse on your own time via another network. If they had concerns about this they would lock down your ability to connect to a 3G network in the first place, not allow it and set up some kind of elaborate sting operation to catch you browsing facebook on a company laptop at home.

Pretty Polly

partyatmygaff wrote: »

Incognito more than likely won't make any difference if they have a robust monitoring setup.

Check if your connection is being passed through a proxy. If it is, I can guarantee you it's being monitored.

Failing that, check for any unusual applications running by opening up the task manager and going to processes.

Thanks for the replies guys. Well i've processes open but not sure what i should look out for?
We don't have an IT department, just the manager, secretary and the rest of the staff:)

Mance Rayder

I wouldn't worry about it too much just download free Ccleaner http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download and use it to wipe all private data (Make sure to tick delete browsing history , form data etc for firefox or internet explorer or whatever your using). Just uninstall any programs you installed and ccleaner before you give it back.

_AVALANCHE_

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=78440177

Pretty Polly

I won't be giving it back for a few months. I clear the history, browsing data and cookies every week or so.

Went through the list of applications in processes and nothing jumped out at me as being odd. Not an expert by any means though.

christmas2012

you could hire someone to have a look for 200 quid there advertised usually in the local papers

partyatmygaff

christmas2012 wrote: »

you could hire someone to have a look for 200 quid there advertised usually in the local papers

200 euro to search a computer for monitoring software? :eek:

bhickey

Pretty Polly wrote: »

Thanks for the replies guys. Well i've processes open but not sure what i should look out for?
We don't have an IT department, just the manager, secretary and the rest of the staff:)

Then I think it'd be reasonable to assume that it's not being monitored. Monitoring would usually be setup by IT staff with too much time on their hands and on the instructions of nosey bosses. Just clean it up and remove any history before you hand it back.

Pretty Polly

christmas2012 wrote: »

you could hire someone to have a look for 200 quid there advertised usually in the local papers

Thanks but theres nothing harmful on the computer. I will clear the history as usual. The manager has a masters in IT and I suppose i just wanted to know for certain

syklops

Pretty Polly wrote: »

Thanks for the replies guys. Well i've processes open but not sure what i should look out for?
We don't have an IT department, just the manager, secretary and the rest of the staff:)

Then I really wouldn't worry. It doesnt sound like they have the resources to be actively monitoring people.

I accidentally discovered Google Chrome Incognito and it just made me think..

I'd LOVE to know what sites your visiting in incognito mode...

yoyo

Is it a company laptop or your own one? If its your own machine surely your boss couldn't require permission to check it? If its a company machine then that is different.
Also €200 for a virus scan :eek::eek: maybe I'm too young but was that the price in the celtic tiger era :P

Nick

Pretty Polly

yoyo wrote: »

Is it a company laptop or your own one? If its your own machine surely your boss couldn't require permission to check it? If its a company machine then that is different.
Also €200 for a virus scan :eek::eek: maybe I'm too young but was that the price in the celtic tiger era :P

Nick

Its a company laptop, we all have one at work. We take it home in case the place is broken into.

Skylops and niman see to have active imaginations regarding my internet usage! :rolleyes: Male at all??

syklops

Pretty Polly wrote: »

Skylops and niman see to have active imaginations regarding my internet usage! :rolleyes: Male at all??

Very much so.

_AVALANCHE_

Safari users watch the most porn.

yoyo

Pretty Polly wrote: »

Its a company laptop, we all have one at work. We take it home in case the place is broken into.

Skylops and niman see to have active imaginations regarding my internet usage! :rolleyes: Male at all??

If its not your machine you are governed under the companies rules, also some companies do install monitoring software on the laptop, so using incognito etc mode would be pointless, you should be aware of its presence though, I think certain versions of Symantec Endpoint is an example

Nick

28064212

There is absolutely no way to guarantee that the company's computer is not tracking what you do. There could be a tracking bug completely independent from the computer attached to the monitor's cable sending everything over the mobile network, and you would never know short of dismantling the laptop and inspecting every single mechanical object

Eboggles

_AVALANCHE_ wrote: »

Safari users watch the most porn.

iPhone users, tsk tsk.

Cuddlesworth

yoyo wrote: »

If its not your machine you are governed under the companies rules, also some companies do install monitoring software on the laptop, so using incognito etc mode would be pointless, you should be aware of its presence though, I think certain versions of Symantec Endpoint is an example

Nick

Proper monitoring software costs a fortune. As said before, there are sweet f all company's monitoring your home internet usage. And if they did, they will be upfront and blatantly honest about it, otherwise they would have to fire a large percentage of their staff after implementing it.

28064212 wrote: »

There is absolutely no way to guarantee that the company's computer is not tracking what you do. There could be a tracking bug completely independent from the computer attached to the monitor's cable sending everything over the mobile network, and you would never know short of dismantling the laptop and inspecting every single mechanical object

While we are heading down the crazy route, they could have drugged your food and implanted a small camera in your eye while passed out, sending signals over a secret satellite network so that your company can accurately figure out how much time you spend playing iphone games on the toilet.

28064212

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

While we are heading down the crazy route, they could have drugged your food and implanted a small camera in your eye while passed out, sending signals over a secret satellite network so that your company can accurately figure out how much time you spend playing iphone games on the toilet.

...no, they couldn't. And if you think that scenario is comparable to a company tracking a machine which they have full access to and can do anything they want to it, you missed the point

Nothingbetter2d

Pretty Polly wrote: »

Basically i use a laptop in work and use the internet at work for work related purposes only.
At home time i bring the laptop home and most evenings connect my Vodafone mobile dongle. I could go on boards, facebook, the dailymail/showbiz, dealpage.ie for example. Can my employer track all these pages? I accidentally discovered Google Chrome Incognito and it just made me think...:)

yes if your browsing through your work's system. the firewall will log all the sites you've been to,

at home no unless your connected via a vpn in which then it would be yes.

even if you clear your browser's history the firewall in work will still hold the logs of what sites you've been to.

Cuddlesworth

28064212 wrote: »

...no, they couldn't. And if you think that scenario is comparable to a company tracking a machine which they have full access to and can do anything they want to it, you missed the point

I think you missed the sarcasm in my post.

Nobody cares about what you do at home.

No company wants to track your usage outside of work.

Your not worth the money, time or effort involved in investing in any tech or software needed to track you.

99% of company's don't even monitor your usage in work outside of basic proxy stats and filtering alerts.

If you are ever special enough to warrant it, you will be told of it before hand(DOD contractors for example).

Pretty Polly

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

I think you missed the sarcasm in my post.

Nobody cares about what you do at home.

No company wants to track your usage outside of work.

Your not worth the money, time or effort involved in investing in any tech or software needed to track you.

99% of company's don't even monitor your usage in work outside of basic proxy stats and filtering alerts.

If you are ever special enough to warrant it, you will be told of it before hand(DOD contractors for example).

I'll continue as normal until my own laptop is fixed. I can't imagine the boss checking or paying to have software installed on them. If he wants to waste the time doing that, good luck to him. Thanks for the advice:)

Cuddlesworth

Pretty Polly wrote: »

I'll continue as normal until my own laptop is fixed. I can't imagine the boss checking or paying to have software installed on them. If he wants to waste the time doing that, good luck to him. Thanks for the advice:)

No problem. There is nothing wrong with a healthy sense of paranoia when dealing with computers in general, but there has to be limits to it.

CiaranC

28064212 wrote: »

...no, they couldn't. And if you think that scenario is comparable to a company tracking a machine which they have full access to and can do anything they want to it, you missed the point

Leaving your hacker fantasies aside, in the real world companies have no business interest in doing this.

28064212

CiaranC wrote: »

Leaving your hacker fantasies aside, in the real world companies have no business interest in doing this.

The question wasn't "Is my employer tracking me?", it was "Can my employer track me?"

Cuddlesworth

28064212 wrote: »

The question wasn't "Is my employer tracking me?", it was "Can my employer track me?"

Being a human and not a computer, I look at the OP's entire message including its nuances, emotion and inflection. Not just the specific part of it that you have decided to home in on. This allows me to see that the OP's real worry was if her employer would be willing to invest the money and time needed to track her home computer usage. This is not a realistic worry and your response does nothing but fan the emotional fear developing.

To put this is perspective, it is in theory possible to recover data of a hard-drive that has been multi formatted and grinded to dust. The reality of the situation is that nobody has the need, money or resources to bother doing it. But using your logic if I said that if I grinded my drive to dust, was the data recoverable? Your answer would be "yes".

28064212

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

Being a human and not a computer, I look at the OP's entire message including its nuances, emotion and inflection. Not just the specific part of it that you have decided to home in on. This allows me to see that the OP's real worry was if her employer would be willing to invest the money and time needed to track her home computer usage. This is not a realistic worry and your response does nothing but fan the emotional fear developing.

And I considered the possibility that if they were asking, they might have good reason to fear it e.g. they've already received a warning for similar, or they have a vindictive boss. That asking might suggest that they're in a situation where an employer would go above and beyond what a 'normal' employer does as routine

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

To put this is perspective, it is in theory possible to recover data of a hard-drive that has been multi formatted and grinded to dust. The reality of the situation is that nobody has the need, money or resources to bother doing it. But using your logic if I said that if I grinded my drive to dust, was the data recoverable? Your answer would be "yes".

Except that tracking usage on a computer that you own and have full access to is not difficult

Cuddlesworth

28064212 wrote: »

And I considered the possibility that if they were asking, they might have good reason to fear it e.g. they've already received a warning for similar, or they have a vindictive boss. That asking might suggest that they're in a situation where an employer would go above and beyond what a 'normal' employer does as routine

You chimed in after the below post. Her original post didn't mention any good reason to fear tracking from her employer. And you failed to question if there was a good reason before implying that she was being tracked.

Pretty Polly wrote: »

Thanks for the replies guys. Well i've processes open but not sure what i should look out for?
We don't have an IT department, just the manager, secretary and the rest of the staff:)

28064212 wrote: »

Except that tracking usage on a computer that you own and have full access to is not difficult

I would love to know how you would implement, filter and monitor the usage of staff outside of the office for low cost in a organisation which consists of no IT department. I came from a company of 2k users with a IT staff of 40 and you would have been laughed out of the room had you suggested monitoring outside usage of laptops.

Keep in mind that you would have to do it for all users not just a single person.

You would also have to have clear and defined guidelines coupled with confirmation from the person that they are aware questionable usage either at home or in work in punishable.

And then you would have to be prepared to stand up in front of the labour court in Ireland and explain to them how home browsing and usage outside of work hours was detrimental to their job and justified punishment.

28064212

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

You chimed in after the below post. Her original post didn't mention any good reason to fear tracking from her employer. And you failed to question if there was a good reason before implying that she was being tracked.

And what I said was that there was no way to guarantee tracking wasn't happening. I never commented on the likelihood of it. I most definitely didn't imply they were being tracked, so you're reading something that isn't there

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

I would love to know how you would implement, filter and monitor the usage of staff outside of the office for low cost in a organisation which consists of no IT department. I came from a company of 2k users with a IT staff of 40 and you would have been laughed out of the room had you suggested monitoring outside usage of laptops.

A simple keylogger would reveal quite a lot of data

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

Keep in mind that you would have to do it for all users not just a single person.

Why?

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

You would also have to have clear and defined guidelines coupled with confirmation from the person that they are aware questionable usage either at home or in work in punishable.

And then you would have to be prepared to stand up in front of the labour court in Ireland and explain to them how home browsing and usage outside of work hours was detrimental to their job and justified punishment.

It would be great if all employers were ethically upstanding members of society that played by the rules all the time. Unfortunately, that's just not true

edanto

I would not browse to anything questionable on a work machine.

Previously, I've worked on a fraud investigation where we collected company laptops and phones from a whole project team and forensically analysed them. This gave us access to a lot of things people thought they had deleted. In the investigation, most people were innocent and had their responsibilities and equipment returned to them, but investigators looked through everything.