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WORK & MONEY BIG BROTHER PLAYS PEEK-A-BOO Published May 13, 1996 Previous columns by Harry Goldstein	Nothing makes bosses more nervous than a multi-purpose communications tool, mainly because "multi" implies extracurricular "purposes," one of them being personal use. And the best office tool since the fax is making managers across the country very nervous indeed. Email allows people to instantly transfer documents, reduce paper waste, and keep in touch with clients and colleagues. It also lets people communicate with friends and family as well as giving them the opportunity to subscribe to various listservs, newsgroups and e-mail 'zines. On top of that, e-mail is replacing the water cooler as the site of gossip and discussion -- you aren't missing from your desk for noticeable periods of time and no one can overhear your e-mail. Or can They? For a manager, personal e-mail poses a most vexing problem, primarily because detecting it requires invasive procedures that most workers would consider a violation of their constitutional rights. And yet, everyday I and my colleagues essentially sign away those rights when we log onto the computer network, which greets us with this message: Good morning, Goldstein, Harry This information network, including all data files and applications, is property of A.C.M.E. All materials and information created, transmitted or stored on this system are the property of ACME and may be accessed by authorized personnel. Users should not copy or transmit any information or applications for personal use without permission from MIS or top management. Users should not have any expectation of privacy with respect to materials and information stored within the network. By pressing a key you are agreeing to the above conditions. Many of my co-workers have admitted that they've never even read that message, or if they did, they saw it once, when they first started working here, and never gave it a second thought. They just hit a key and go about their business, living in a blissful state of denial.
	It's not just e-mail we're talking about. What about that resume you have on your hard drive, so it's handy to print out on the office laser printer when that particularly toothsome classified ad comes your way? Or the novel you work on during lunch? Or the spreadsheet you do your monthly household budget on? Would we be just as complacent about having to sign a waiver before we sat down at our desks that gave the company permission to root through our desk drawers and file cabinets? Or what if all phone conversations were monitored, to ensure that we weren't making personal calls on company time? Well...what about it? We have two choices -- refuse to log onto the system, get fired and go to court with a very shaky case, or comply and adapt, with the attitude that if They nail one of us, They're going to have to nail all of us. Besides, as long as we follow the Prime Directive of Work Life, everything should be fine: Cover Thine Ass.
	Clean out your mailbox on a daily basis and save important correspondence to a floppy disk. Don't give MIS anything to look at and chances are you can discretely conduct your e-mail correspondence forever. Don't title your personal e-mail and ask your correspondents to do the same with e-mail they send to you. Don't use code names in your messages when talking about other people in the office -- once They figure out who you're talking about (and chances are it won't be that hard, even for Them), those hilarious notes you've been trading with your colleague about the primal grunting coming from your boss in the next bathroom stall could your be last. As long as you're getting your work done, management really shouldn't have a beef with personal e-mail, especially since it costs companies way less than long distance. Also, if you have to keep your documents and spreadsheets on your computer, store them on your local hard drive, not on the network server. They could still access your files, but They'd have to go to a good deal of trouble to do so. The hours you spend at your job are impossible to divorce from the rest of your life. You will worry about bills or obsess about your relationship and you'll need to stay in contact with friends and family, not to mention accountants, doctors, lawyers, and headhunters. Only automatons can completely separate their work lives from their private lives; unless, of course, they have no lives at all, which means they're making a helluva lot more money than we are. Harry Goldstein is a writer and editor living in Manhattan. His work has appeared in Utne Reader, American Book Review, Promethean, AltX, word.com, and other periodicals. For more privacy-related information, check out the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. © 1996 Harry Goldstein, All Rights Reserved