How a new age of surveillance is changing work

監(jiān)控的新時(shí)代如何改變工作

Employee surveillance

監(jiān)控員工

Look out: your boss may be watching you

注意：你的老板可能在監(jiān)視你

Workplace surveillance is nothing new. The dark Satanic mills of 18th-century Britain had supervisors to crack the whip. Shops have long used CCTV to monitor customers and staff, and some factory and warehouse workers have had to face the humiliation of timed toilet breaks. Still, if you enjoy the comfort of a white-collar job, you may be stunned to learn just how much you are being watched.

監(jiān)控工作場(chǎng)所并不是什么新鮮事。18世紀(jì)英國(guó)黑暗的撒旦工廠有揮舞著鞭子的監(jiān)工。長(zhǎng)期以來(lái)，商店一直使用閉路電視監(jiān)控顧客和員工，一些工廠和倉(cāng)庫(kù)的工人不得不面對(duì)計(jì)時(shí)上廁所的羞辱。不過(guò)，如果你喜歡舒適的白領(lǐng)工作，你可能會(huì)對(duì)自己受到的“監(jiān)視”之多感到驚訝。

Calls and emails are monitored using ever more advanced software. Artificial intelligence (ai) is taking the snooping to new levels, tracking everything from Zoom-call rictus and twitchy keyboard strokes to the consistent note of irritation in your voice, in an attempt to assess your productivity and judge your state of mind.

【1】twitchy 神經(jīng)緊張的；焦慮不安的

【2】rictus 呲牙咧嘴

電話和電子郵件可以用更先進(jìn)的軟件監(jiān)控。人工智能正在將窺探提升到一個(gè)新的水平，它會(huì)追蹤你的所有信息，從Zoom-call時(shí)的呲牙咧嘴、敲擊鍵盤時(shí)的焦躁，到你聲音中持續(xù)的憤怒，它試圖評(píng)估你的生產(chǎn)力和判斷你的精神狀態(tài)。

Surveillance is rising because work-from-home policies mean that employers are keen to keep tabs on their remote workforce. Before the pandemic, around one in ten of the large businesses asked by Gartner, a research firm, had spying software. Within three years it expects the share to reach 70%.

【1】keep a tab or tabs on sb/sth 監(jiān)視某人/某物

監(jiān)視正在變多，因?yàn)檫h(yuǎn)程工作的政策意味著雇主們熱衷于監(jiān)視他們的遠(yuǎn)程員工。在疫情爆發(fā)前，咨詢公司高德納調(diào)查的大型企業(yè)中，約有十分之一的公司擁有監(jiān)控軟件。預(yù)計(jì)在三年內(nèi)，這一比例將達(dá)到70%。

Bosses also have ever-expanding amounts of data at their disposal, enlarging the digital footprint that can be monitored. Widely used software such as Google Workspace, Microsoft Teams or Slack can tell managers what time you clock in or how many calls you join on their platforms. Employee badges fitted with motion sensors and microphones can alert bosses if someone is loafing about. The blurring boundaries between work and home mean that video surveillance and other intrusive tools are barging into workers’ personal lives, social-media accounts and private devices at all times of the day.【1】at sb's disposal 供某人使用?

【2】clock in 打卡上班

【3】loaf about 游手好閑

【4】barge into 闖入；打擾

老板們也有越來(lái)越多的數(shù)據(jù)可以處理，擴(kuò)大了可以監(jiān)控的數(shù)字“足跡”。 Google Workspace、Microsoft Teams或Slack等廣泛使用的軟件可以告訴管理者你什么時(shí)候打卡上班，或者你在他們的平臺(tái)上打了多少通電話。員工的胸卡裝有運(yùn)動(dòng)傳感器和麥克風(fēng)，它可以在有人偷懶時(shí)提醒老板。工作和家庭之間的界限越來(lái)越模糊，這意味著視頻監(jiān)控和其他侵入性工具無(wú)時(shí)無(wú)刻不在侵入員工的個(gè)人生活、社交媒體賬戶和私人設(shè)備。

The law is scrambling to adjust. In the state of New York employees subject to electronic monitoring must be told in advance, under a new law introduced on May 7th. Connecticut and Delaware require similar disclosures. California is considering new laws to strengthen privacy protections for workers, including a ban on digital monitoring without prior notice. The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation establishes some basic rights for staff. Yet it is still early days and the technology is advancing fast. As a result, most firms are only just getting their heads around how much remote work is likely to remain permanent. A clear boundary between embracing new technologies on the one hand, and protecting workers on the other, has still to be drawn.

【1】get your mind/head around sth 弄懂（復(fù)雜或奇怪的事）

法律正在匆忙進(jìn)行調(diào)整。根據(jù)5月7日出臺(tái)的一項(xiàng)新法律，在紐約州，要想使用電子監(jiān)控員工，需提前告知?？的腋裰莺吞乩A州要求類似的披露。加州正在考慮制定新的法律來(lái)加強(qiáng)對(duì)員工隱私的保護(hù)，包括禁止在沒(méi)有事先通知的情況下進(jìn)行數(shù)字監(jiān)控。歐盟的《通用數(shù)據(jù)保護(hù)條例》規(guī)定了員工的一些基本權(quán)利。然而，它仍處于早期階段，技術(shù)正在快速發(fā)展。因此，大多數(shù)公司只是在弄清楚遠(yuǎn)程辦公有多大可能是永久性的。一方面擁抱新技術(shù)，另一方面保護(hù)工人，兩者之間的明確界限仍有待劃定。

There are perfectly legitimate reasons for surveillance at work. Many jobs require monitoring for safety, security and compliance. Investment banks’ traders are tracked to prevent insider dealing, and the decisions of social-media moderators are traced and recorded to ensure consistency and accountability. In the same way that companies collect data on customers’ behaviour in order to improve their products, so professional employers are using monitoring tools to measure the productivity and engagement of their most important resource: their people. In the future such tools could help spot bad posture, root out bullying, and identify and share best practice among staff.【1】insider trading 內(nèi)幕交易

【比較】safety 以及 security 釋義：

safety：a state in which or a place where you are safe and not in danger or at risk safety指的是被保護(hù)起來(lái)的狀態(tài)，遠(yuǎn)離那些有可能引起傷害的事物。safety還可以用來(lái)指代一種狀態(tài)。

security：protection of a person, building, organization, or country against threats such as crime or attacks by foreign countries security泛指對(duì)個(gè)人、組織和財(cái)產(chǎn)的保護(hù)，使它們免遭外部威脅和一些犯罪活動(dòng)的損害。需要注意的是，security更多聚焦在那些有意對(duì)個(gè)人、組織和財(cái)產(chǎn)施加傷害的行為。

在工作中進(jìn)行監(jiān)視是完全合理的。許多工作出于對(duì)安全性和合規(guī)性的考量會(huì)進(jìn)行監(jiān)控。監(jiān)視投資銀行的交易員，以防止內(nèi)幕交易，跟蹤并記錄社交媒體審核員的決定，以確保一致性和問(wèn)責(zé)制。就像企業(yè)為了改進(jìn)產(chǎn)品而收集客戶行為數(shù)據(jù)一樣，專業(yè)的雇主也在使用監(jiān)控工具來(lái)衡量他們最重要的人力資源（即員工）的生產(chǎn)率以及參與度。在未來(lái)，這些工具可以幫助發(fā)現(xiàn)不良態(tài)度，根除欺凌行為，并在員工中識(shí)別和分享最佳做法。

Yet it is easy to see the pitfalls. There is a long history of those with power abusing those without in the name of compliance and efficiency. In the most extreme cases, 20th-century despots ran vast informant networks, and some slave plantations in America and the West Indies kept tyrannical work records.

【1】informant 提供消息的人

然而，很容易看出其中的隱患。長(zhǎng)久以來(lái)，有權(quán)力的人會(huì)以服從和效率的名義“虐待”那些沒(méi)有權(quán)力的人。在最極端的情況下，20世紀(jì)的專制者擁有龐大的線人網(wǎng)絡(luò)，美國(guó)和西印度群島的一些奴隸種植園還保留著暴虐的工作記錄。

Today’s workers are not indentured, obviously. But many studies link excessive individual surveillance to higher levels of stress. And if algorithms trained on biased data are used to make more decisions, the odds of discrimination will rise. One analysis found that ai systems consistently interpret black faces as being angrier than white ones.

顯然，今天的員工是沒(méi)有受契約束縛的。但許多研究將過(guò)度的個(gè)人監(jiān)控與更高水平的壓力聯(lián)系起來(lái)。如果算法是基于有偏數(shù)據(jù)進(jìn)行訓(xùn)練的，并用來(lái)做更多的決定，歧視的可能性就會(huì)增加。一項(xiàng)分析發(fā)現(xiàn)，人工智能系統(tǒng)一貫認(rèn)為黑人臉比白人臉更憤怒。

What to do? As law and practice evolve, some principles should govern workplace surveillance. Individuals must be fully informed, as the New York law provides. Some firms now disclose monitoring methods in the fine print of their employee handbooks, and specify what data managers have access to. But that is no substitute for consistent, easily understood information for staff—so they can decide how to behave at work, and whom they choose to work for.

【1】fine print / small print 附加細(xì)則

要做什么嗎？隨著法律和實(shí)踐的發(fā)展，工作場(chǎng)所監(jiān)控應(yīng)當(dāng)遵循一些原則。根據(jù)紐約法律的規(guī)定，個(gè)人必須充分了解（監(jiān)控）情況。一些公司現(xiàn)在在員工手冊(cè)的細(xì)則中披露了監(jiān)控方法，并明確規(guī)定數(shù)據(jù)管理人員可以訪問(wèn)哪些數(shù)據(jù)。但這并不能代替員工們一致、易于理解的信息——這樣他們就可以決定在工作中如何表現(xiàn)，選擇為誰(shuí)工作。

Employers should have a legitimate reason for surveillance. Although the boundary will take time to establish through case law and precedent, this is vital to ensure that monitoring is proportionate. Firms should not have access to employees’ private devices, provided they are not used for work. And significant decisions made by algorithms should be subject to appeal and review by human beings. Establishing clear guidelines is not easy, but qualms over the potential abuse of surveillance will grow. It’s time to start drawing some lines.?

雇主應(yīng)該有合法的理由進(jìn)行監(jiān)視。雖然通過(guò)判例法和先例來(lái)確定界限需要時(shí)間，但這對(duì)于確保“監(jiān)控是適當(dāng)?shù)摹敝陵P(guān)重要。公司不應(yīng)該訪問(wèn)員工的私人設(shè)備，前提是這些設(shè)備不是用于工作。由算法做出的重大決策應(yīng)該受到人類的申訴和審查。制定明確的指導(dǎo)方針并不容易，但對(duì)可能濫用監(jiān)控的疑慮將會(huì)增加。是時(shí)候劃定一些界線了。