Google is again making headlines with its operations and policies. Its employees have alleged that an internal surveillance tool developed by the Company is being installed in all the computers to facilitate search and monitoring of all internal systems.
It is reported that the tool will automatically alert management about employees who create a calendar event with over 10 rooms or 100 participants. Clearly, the leadership is trying to put in place ways to get to know without any delay if and when employees try to organise themselves.
However, the Company maintains that the tool is just an extension that reminds people to think before automatically adding a meeting to the calendars of large groups of employees. According to the Company, the extension was created to counter the huge number of spams that were generated due to calendars and events. Google maintains that the tool does not gather personal information about any of the employees and does not hinder the use of calendars either. It only presents a sort of speed breaker when employees try to connect with too many of their peers.
It is reported that once installed, the tool cannot be removed from the computers by the employees.
This browser tool that apparently monitors meeting requests by workers and keeps watch on them, goes against the ‘open’ and liberal culture that Google is otherwise famous for.
