Who Is Monitoring You

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Who is Monitoring You?

Barry Steinhardt of the ACLU Technology and Liberty Program said, “Keystroke monitors destroy boundries between and employer’s facilities and the employee’s personal buisness.”

This issue about keyboard monitoring software comes from issue 5-1 on page 5.04. Keyboard or keystroke monitoring software is an application program that captures the signals that move between the keyboard and the computer and then it stores all the keystrokes in a file on the computer or it sends them to a remote user.1 I think that keyboard monitoring software is good and that it should be used at work or at home with the knowledge of the user. Many people say this is an invasion of privacy and they don’t think keyboard monitoring software should ever be used.

If some people say it is bad, should keyboard monitoring software ever be used? If so, when? I think that keyboard monitoring should be used both at home and at the workplace. It is good to use at home because a person could check what a child or spouse is doing. Most of the software coming out now has five monitoring tools all in one, they can simultaniously monitor

 Email

 Chats or chatrooms

 Keystrokes

1 Shelly, Cashman, Vermaat. Discovering Computers 2004: A Gatway to Information. Boston: Thomson Course Technology, 2003.

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 Instant messageing

 Websites2

Now people will say that monitoring is an invasion of privacy or that there should be trust from the spouse or child and I would agree but I also think monitoring is good if the user is told the sofware is installed. I also think that the keyboard monitoring software should be used in buisness because when you are at work you are on their time and equipment.

Some buisnesses, like financial institutions, don’t have the option whether or not to monitor they are required to, but the company should use judgment and talk to the user if any incidents occur and not just accuse them outright. This software should be used right now because it will help protect both family and buisness. Of course, it is up to them to decide if they want to use the software or not but I think it is beneficial.

2 Computer Surveilance Software. 6 Oct. 2003 .

Some of the makers of the software recommend the computer user be informed about the installed software.3 Is this good? I think if the home user is told that the program has been put on the computer then there is less of a chance for problems to arise later on. I also think that the buisness user should be informed that the software is on the computer. That way they know anything they write on that computer that is questionable the company will see it and so they don’t waste the companies time and money. It is a good thing that the people who make the software even recommend the user be informed it shows thinking on their part that some serious problems could come up if a user does not know that what they type on the computer is being recorded.

Vocabulary Terms Definitions

Keystroke monitors Software or hardware that records every character typed on keyboards.

Keystroke monitoring software Captures the signals that move between the keyboard and computer and stores it in a file or sends it to a remote user. Hardware keystroke monitors Connects the keyboard plug to a PC PS/2 port and records and saves information to a chip. It can be easily dissabled.

3 Bannan, Karen J. “Watching You , Watching Me.” PC Magazine 1 July 2002: 21.

Bannan, Karen J. “Watching You, Watching Me.” PC Magazine 1 July 2002: 21.

Shelly, Cashman, Vermaat. Discovering Computers 2004: A Gatway to Information. Boston:

Thomson Course Technology, 2003.

Computer Surveillance Software. 6 Oct. 2003 .

0e9f422ab028af29367568e398846a4f.doc