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Do IT Pros Abuse Their Power?
An anonymous reader writes "I have noticed that many airports and hospitals I've visited have some kind of internet usage policy in place. Some use software similar to Websense, which effectively blocks sites based on blacklisting them by category. A commonly used blacklist prevents users from accessing 'forums or discussion boards,' yet I find that often these networks allow users to access sites like Fark, Slashdot, Digg and other message boards that appeal to the technical culture one might find in the IT world. In your experience, do IT administrators abuse their supervisory powers? Has there ever been a backlash from users or management for doing so?"
...are Fark and Digg considered 'technical culture' sites. Seriously, this isn't 2001. Last time I checked, the Internet had sort of entered the mainstream and 'slacking off at work' isn't really considered exclusively IT.
This is a sig. It is like every other sig in the world, except that it is mine, and it is different.
Absolute power, is even more fun!</bofh>
Yes, we did have something like this happen where I work. Our IT group ended up blocking all social networking sites. Our marketing department raised a fit because they use Facebook for business purposes.
How many people here get around their workplace's blocking software by running an SSH tunnel to a proxy server on their home network?
Its human nature.
... to push the limits of our power and find ways to get around things. This is often seen in a negative light (as in the OP's choice of the word "abuse"), yet it's also a trait that has allowed humans to survive, thrive, and make numerous advancements.
The OP talks about IT people white-listing websites they know to be safe because they themselves use them. I don't see this as having a negative impact for the staff or patrons of the places he mentions. If there is a negative impact, or "abuse", it comes from the executive decision to use censoring software in the first place, not the IT guy poking holes in it.
I have seen that "lockdown" so many times, and it never works. There are no technical solutions to personnel problems. I always use this analogy; "You can make a car very secure by removing the battery and putting it up on blocks. It just doesn't make for a very good car."
"Car on blocks" is a good description. Our PHBs have included a "books and literature" prohibition that blocks all on-line books and magazines, including the archives from the big technical publishers. It makes it hard so satisfy the PHB command "Technical lackey, find out everything about this 20-year old technology and give me a one paragraph summary on how it will be our 'next big thing.'" Especially after PHB burned the technical library to expand his office.
This usually results on having to go home and work it our there, outside IT/PHB control. Then have a long lunch and take the rest of the day off. The productivity improvements are stunning.
In my experience the IT dept generally has rules for other people and rules for themselves.
Different responsibilities, different rules. nothing abnormal. Every department has different rules for itself and for others.
They "know what they are doing" while everybody else "can't be trusted"
And this is why. And it is true, not because other people are idiots, but simply as a matter of policy. Again, the same thing goes for other departments. (ever tried to get the same access to the corporate funds that the finance department has ?)
Their login for general usage is full administrator
If that is true they are idiots.
while I am barred from sites "listed as general business" (only sites pre-approved by IT are allowed, which they make very clear they do not do because they don't want people asking them all the time)
Typically this happens because management demands a system that makes sure people do not waste time on non work related websites. IT say's that is only possible by using a very labor intensive white-list setup for which they do not have to manpower to mange. Management forces it anyway. IT gives change requests for the white list the lowest priority. solution. don't complain to IT. Tell your management what you need to do your work and let them take care of it. After all, they caused the problem.
They install whatever they like, including such productivity tools as BBC news sports tickers
yep, the job comes with some advantages. Of course the everybody else "can't be trusted" rule is the major cause for this.
When another member of staff requires a new PC, they get an IT staff's PC and IT get a new PC. Despite the general staff doing work where screen real estate is highly productive, their monitors are 15" and 17" while IT and managers have 19" (although they were quite savvy and gave the partners 21"; monitors are the new bigger desk and chair). In my job where we do quite a lot of printing, speed and quality are important, IT also have the best printer - yet it took a week for them to notice when I unplugged it one Friday night.
Typically this has to do with budgets.
Business: I need a new PC/printer/whatever.
IT: ok, which budget can we charge.
Business: charge ? budget ? well, I taught you probably have something laying around.
And of course IT needs new stuff first to gain experience with it.
IT is all about convenience for IT. All our productivity stuff, which at any given moment 99% of staff is running at any given moment, is quite server intensive. They're all on the same server, while low-intensity stuff rarely used has three idle servers all to itself. I spend a significant portion of my time waiting for the server to respond.
Budgets again. everyone wants new, faster servers, nobody wants to pay for it. It has probably advised to upgrade/replace them years ago.
I pointed out once that the servers could be rebalanced to distribute the load but was told "that would be too much hassle".
From the mind of the IT department: "Yeah, right you fucking cheap ass. not willing to spend some money for a decent server, even though we warned you for years, and now you want US to do a lot of risky work to alleviate your problem, at the expense of others who did take appropriate action when we warned them. f*ck you."
All the procedures are laughable. Despite almost completely phasing paper filing out, all staff's basic logins can delete data files and all the backups are kept on a shelf on site. I could obliterate the lot in one minute of madness (probably induced by dealing with IT). It would take me longer to copy it all to a couple of USB sticks, but nobody would notice until they got the blackmail letters or it was on the news.
Likely manag
Considering that it is the IT dept that sets the policies and managed the network they can do what they want. At the IT dept. I work for we have all of our machines running dual NIC’s with one on a separate subnet from the rest of the infrastructure. We have that subnet set as a DMZ so we have full access. No firewall, filtering, or monitoring. As the tech support for the whole company if they don’t like it we can slow down our support and lower our quality of service. For now management doesn’t bother us because we are very good at what we do.
there are 10 types of people in this world, those who read binary and those who don't. which are you!
Yes, but the question was "Is it abused".
In our building Facebook is blocked along with many other forums that would help developers get their job done. The abuse comes in when our other building (the one where IT & upper management are located) doesn't block these forums or facebook.
Management needs Facebook & YouTube, but I can't read someone's blog about getting around a specific C# programming problem?
Would you rather have them busy with Facebook and Youtube or busy trying to "manage" the developers? I don't know about your work situation, but I've found TOR is pretty much capable of getting around most filters...
At the company I work for, the users had unrestricted access to the internet. Then they started abusing that freedom by going to porn sites, soaking up all the bandwidth with streaming music and YouTube, and happily going to every malware website possible. We got fed up with blocking IP ranges at the firewall, having to tell a user not to stream media, and finding out how creative a user can get with getting malware. I campaigned for and got a content filter. Not everyone gets a "no internets" policy. We start off with restricting the really malicious sites first, then allow full access to those that need it (e.g. underwriting), then make category blocks like porn, and then granular as each department head sees fit. So far everyone has gotten use to it. Sites do get miscategorized from time to time, but we can unblock them and recategorize them as needed. Really we should have had something like this when I first started since there is a possibility for unrestricted access to become a liability. OP, if you want a website unblocked, put a request to the netadmin to have it unblocked. Otherwise appreciate that you do have some level of an internet connection that you're not paying for, get some means of a VPN that wont restrict internet access, or pay a hefty sum for an aircard.