Once I had an issue where I had to request access to a 3rd party vendor URL from my work machine. IT was telling me that I already had access, and that I had accessed the URL several times. Weird, because I was getting a dns resolve error. To prove that he wasn't making it up, the IT guy shared his screen with me.

Ever since I saw his screen and the level of details in my activity log on the work machine, I don't even access example.com on their device anymore.

I'm sure this workers already has invasive tracking software on her work machines. Now the company was just trying to fire her without it counting as a layoff.

That is an insanely bad look for that employer. This kind of invasive employee monitoring is treating people like property rather than as human beings. The problem is that the power dynamic between employers and employees in many countries is such that they can make the most outrageous demands and people will have to comply because there is always another person ready to step into their shoes.

I wonder how many employer-provided laptops are secretly recording video or audio for WFH staff. You can tape over a webcam, but what do you do about a microphone you don't trust?

Friendly reminder that Macbooks hardware disable the internal microphone if the lid is shut. https://support.apple.com/guide/security/hardware-microphone...