Since employee monitoring has become a widely known and used tool, many people try to trick it and play around it. It’s human nature to try to find ways to outsmart the other one and work outside the rules without being caught. So, even though you implemented a software to log computer activity you can’t let your guard down. 

You would be astonished if you knew what are employees capable of in order to trick such a software. So, in this article, we’ll cover some of the most typical ways of how do people try to work around such a tool. 

Case #1

You might not believe this at first glance, but a ridiculous method employees use to fool the web browsing monitoring software is by attaching a battery-operated toy to the computer’s mouse. When the toy moves, the mouse will move as well and the software will record this activity. Therefore, it would seem like the employee has been doing something where in fact, they haven’t. However, if you try to actually check the screenshots, you’ll understand that your employee has tried to cheat on you.

And that’s why this is the perfect time to emphasize how important it is to have a screen monitoring software for pc with a screenshot option. You can set that screenshots are taken every let’s say 30 minutes and have a solid evidence of what are your employees doing at a particular moment.

Case #2

Many jobs have what’s called a two-monitor system. The employee uses two monitors for their work, just because it’s easier to control everything in front of their eyes. But,it turns out that a lot of employee watch programs can’t really collect data from both monitors. So, what do employees do? They conduct business as usual using the monitor which is being watched by the software, and lurk on Instagram or Facebook on the other one. Simple as that.

This is exactly why it’s important to get a quality, professional monitoring software for network computers. They might cost a little extra, but they got you covered and your employees will have minimum chance of tricking you. 

Case #3

Remember that screenshot option which most screen monitoring software have? Well, people figured it out as well. Some employees try to cheat the system by estimating the period on which the screenshots are taken. They pretend to be working at that exact moment and later on just continue being unproductive. 

Thankfully, many monitoring systems don’t rely just on the screenshot option. At the end of each day, you’ll get a visual representation of how and on what your employees were spending their time. So, even if they tricked the screenshot, they can’t trick their overall productivity levels. 

Case #4

Some employees go to such extent and mess with the code of the software that tracks computer activity itself. If they have a bit more knowledge, they can find the source and tailor it so that it can’t monitor some of their activities. Now I’m not saying that this is super easy and that most employees do it. In fact, it’s extremely difficult and it’s often not the case. But, writing this article I’ve read about a few situations which happened in the companies that implemented software to track computer use. So, it’s not impossible. Although, if you have such a software, you can always contact the customer service and if you suspect something similar has occurred, they can easily look into the issue. 

Conclusion

To round up, even if you implemented an employee monitoring software, you can’t ease your mind. If you manage a lot of employees, chances are some of them will try to trick it. It’s just a statistic. And if that does happen, hopefully this article has helped you recognize some of the typical ways that employees try to avoid monitoring.

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There are some other ways your employees could be trying to trick your monitoring software, so try searching how to trick ActivTrak (or whatever the name of your software is), and you'll be able to find all the tips and tricks employees are sharing with each other.

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