Monday, February 7, 2011
The Importance Of Software Monitoring And Reasons You Should Have It
One of the primary importance of the program is monitoring online content. This has particularly been helpful to bosses and parents as it has allowed them to access emails, chat rooms, websites, blog spots among other web material. The bosses have been able to control the web activity at the work place hence, restrain workers from engaging in idle and unproductive online activity during working hours. Some bosses have taken this to another level by blocking social networks and websites which promote idleness at work. Parents and employers among other people have been able to successfully curb any abuse of their PC and shared networks through the monitoring programs. For parents it has been about protecting their children from negatively impacting content and sites while employees have been keen to reduce the wastage of time and resources on unproductive online activities during working hours.
This has also helped institutions especially the public ones to regulate what users of their computer networks can access. Universities, colleges, libraries and cyber cafes are some of the main beneficiaries of these programs as they can control what the public accesses. The emergence of social networks, has brought social risks and vulnerabilities upon every user especially children. Apart from predators who prey on minors, there are other aspects such as internet bullies and addiction which put your child at risk. This calls for monitoring and controlling such sites to ensure that your child's developmental process is not interfered with.
Another consideration is the features included in the programs. The program that one purchases must be able to maximize on control in order for it to be effective. Online observation is one key feature. The program being purchased must be able to record all sites visited and searches made via the internet. It must also record copies of instant messages, chat messages as well email attachments and all correspondences via email. The best programs can give you access to user names and passwords of different accounts accessed. For one to acquire the licensed and legal monitoring program, they must fulfill either of three conditions. They must prove that they own a computer and they must prove that other users of the computer network are aware and consent to the installation of the program or alternatively they must prove that they are parents of a minor. For parents with young children, this might not be a problem.
To acquire the software monitoring program one needs to certify that they are either parents to a minor, owner of a computer or they have the consent of other users of the network to install the program. Illegal installation of such, monitoring programs leads to spyware and this poses legal threat to the owner of the computer.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Desktop Remote Monitoring Service, A Great Way To Increase Profits
Statistics have shown time and time again that employees that have connection to the internet are prone to surfing the web. As a business owner, you are not only paying for all of those wasted hours, but you are also losing significant amounts of productivity and profits. The best way for you to get those hours back and increase your productivity is with a desktop remote monitoring service.
Chances are that you have already tried various tools and methods to encourage your employees to not use the internet for personal reasons. However, they did not help and you just ended up wasting your money. You might run a business where internet access is vital and cutting service is not an option. Furthermore, blocking websites with filtering software can have negative results when your employees are also blocked from sites they need to be able to access.
For these reasons, you may be considering a desktop remote monitoring service. These services provide professional internet monitoring and keep tabs on how much time your employees devote to productivity and how much time they spend playing at your expensive. Furthermore, these services can also be used to ensure that your employees are not accessing websites that can be harmful to your network or that they are not leaking confidential data, either unintentionally or not.
There are a wide variety of remote monitoring tools and software packages available. You will need to determine how much you want to spend on monitoring software, what you want it to monitor, and how you want the data to be monitored. Furthermore, monitoring internet usage is time consuming, so you may also need to consider hiring specialists or subscribing to a monitoring service.
As technology costs get lower, monitoring software and services also get cheaper. In fact, some basic software packages are free. Online services will provide the programs that you need without business owners having to invest in costly tools or worry about upgrades.
You will also have to consider how in depth you want the monitoring to be. Basic monitoring programs keep lists of what websites your employees viewed without much additional data. More advanced programs can capture detailed information about their internet activities, such as how much time was spent on each website or what was downloaded or uploaded to and from the website. Other programs even log employee keystrokes, capture emails, and can even record voice.
There are two primary ways that data is remotely monitored. The most secure method is to have computer personnel monitor the information directly from the network. This prevents the data they monitor from being leaked to the internet. However, this would require that you hire employees who are skilled and may be too costly. On the other hand, outsourcing to an online monitoring service is much more economical, but all of the data is at risk to being intercepted by potential adversaries to your company.
No matter what software package of service that you ultimately choose, you have a legal obligation to inform your employees that you are monitoring their activities. Otherwise, you could be breaking the law and be punished with lawsuits, fines, or imprisonment. The most effective way to make them aware of the monitoring is to have your employees sign documentation that they acknowledge and consent to the monitoring.
A great way to increase productivity and profitability in a workplace that has internet access is through desktop monitoring services. They give business owners the ability to monitor internet usage without truly restricting access. And for some businesses, the increase in profits may even outweigh the costs of these services.