One-Third Of Companies Monitoring Email

dotpavan writes "While studies have shown that spying on workers tends to make them less productive, that hasn't stopped approximately 1/3 of all U.S. companies from employing email monitoring tools. 43% of those companies employ staff to check outgoing emails. This seems like quite a waste. While there are some times when it makes sense to monitor emails (or it's required by law), most of the time, this seems like a complete waste of money. Not only are you upsetting workers and decreasing productivity, the benefits are pretty hard to spot. The number of "problem" emails tends to be incredibly low. If someone really wants to send out inappropriate emails, they're going to figure out some other way to do so, such as via a free webmail account somewhere. Yet, the companies are buying up expensive tools and hiring staff to watch just in case they catch the one or two problematic emails that go over the corporate network."

Comments

Yes, A waste.

[Erris]

You wouldn't consider hiring folks to monitor e-mail if your firm suffered public embarrassment or lost business due to leaked information.

I would consider it a waste of my time to work for a company that had something to hide and treated me as a potential whistle blower all the time.

I honestly cannot blame [companies for not trusting their employees]

You must have things to hide, so I no longer trust you. Thanks for the warning.