Does VPN Disable Employee Tracking?
VPN, or Virtual Private Network, is a common feature used by many businesses to protect their data against any kind of interception. Individuals may also use a VPN to keep their location and data private. But does using a VPN disable employee tracking?
VPN generally does not disable employee tracking software. The employee tracking software can function within the same encrypted network and keep track of activities along with an active VPN.
Read below for more information on how VPN and employee tracking software can work simultaneously.
What is Employee Tracking?
Employee monitoring, as its name suggests, is the activity of keeping track of the activities of employees while they are on the clock.
Monitoring can refer to a wide variety of activities, including recording phone calls, checking emails, keeping track of websites browsed online, monitoring employees’ use of the internet, and even deploying video surveillance.
In the past few years, monitoring employees has generated heated controversy as people weigh the benefits of surveillance against the inevitable invasion of privacy that comes with it. However, there are advantages for businesses when employee monitoring is carried out lawfully and transparently.
Why Are Employees Tracked?
There are many reasons why an employer may decide to track their employees, including the following:
Security
Companies in the financial sector, among others, must ensure that their employees exercise extreme caution and confidentiality when handling client records and other confidential information. Businesses have a harder time ensuring that their employees are following the rules when they work remotely rather than in an office.
One approach to dealing with such compliance issues is to ensure that staff adhere to the best practices for the specific industry. To do this, many businesses have begun implementing monitoring software that keeps an eye on employees and whether they are incorporating the industry standard practices in their work tasks.
Performance Evaluation
Employee monitoring can provide information about employees’ performance and help uncover any performance concerns. Employers can evaluate their workers’ levels of productivity, pinpoint any skills or training deficiencies, and provide relevant guidance and criticism to improve performance.
This will lead to enhanced worker performance, higher levels of motivation, and greater overall organizational productivity.
Time and Resource Allocation
Efficient management of both time and resources is one of the most critical factors contributing to the success of any firm.
Employee monitoring can help businesses get the most out of their resources by showing them what tasks are taking up time, how to make schedules more efficient, and where processes are inefficient or not working right. This has the potential to lead to more efficient use of both time and resources and higher output overall.
Effective Communication and Collaboration
The success of an organization also depends on its members’ ability to communicate and work together effectively. By giving insights into the activities and interactions of team members, employee monitoring can make it easier for members of the team to communicate and work together.
Monitoring software can also help discover any gaps in communication or failures, which enables organizations to take corrective actions and improve the dynamics of their teams. This can lead to stronger teamwork, greater innovation, and higher productivity.
Online Threats
Another reason why businesses install monitoring software, particularly web monitoring software, is to protect themselves from malicious activities such as fishing and other online dangers.
Does VPN Disable Employee Tracking?
A Virtual Private Network (VPN) is a service that encrypts your online traffic and hides your IP address, a number that is used to identify your device and location on the internet.
Using a VPN redirects your data through an encrypted server located in another country before it reaches its final destination. Doing this will make it appear as though your online activity is coming from the server’s IP address rather than your own.
A VPN generally does not disable employee tracking or computer monitoring software. VPNs are generally concerned with securing the connection between the device and the internet by encrypting traffic, while employee tracking software is typically meant to monitor activity on a device or network.
Although a VPN can increase the amount of privacy between a worker’s computer and the VPN server by encrypting the data transferred between the two, it doesn’t stop tracking at the device level.
The employee monitoring software will continue to track the activity on the device even while the connection is encrypted because it can work within the encrypted connection.
Most employee tracking software also uses more than one way to track activity, such as recording keystrokes, taking screenshots, tracking application usage, and online browsing history. A VPN does nothing to stop or prevent the functioning of such features.
Business Vs. Commercial VPN
A business VPN service is that which employees can access through their employer. While connected to the company VPN, however, all of your web traffic is routed through that server. Although your online activities will be hidden from the general public, your employer will be able to monitor them because they have access to the same server.
Business VPN servers do not provide no-log options because of strict security policies. Everything you do will be recorded, and your information will be saved for future use.
A commercial VPN is one that the worker independently sets up or pays for. A commercial VPN service will encrypt your data as it travels over the internet and tunnel it through their own servers.
If you are accessing the internet through a commercial VPN service, your employer won’t be able to see what you do online unless they have monitoring software installed on the device. For instance, if your laptop already has keyloggers, a VPN won’t be able to mask your typing activities from an employer.
Lastly, many businesses discourage employees from setting up independent VPNs on their work devices.
Conclusion
So, while using a VPN does serve to provide a secure connection and enhance user privacy, it doesn’t do much to disable employee tracking software. The software will be able to monitor the activity like normal.