Contract Lawyers Face a Growing Invasion of Surveillance Programs that Monitor their Work (washingtonpost.com) 59
The attorneys worry that if law firms, traditionally the defenders of workers' rights, are turning to the programs, why wouldn't every other business? From a report: Camille Anidi, an attorney on Long Island, quickly understood the flaws of the facial recognition software her employers demanded she use when working from home. The system often failed to recognize her face or mistook the Bantu knots in her hair as unauthorized recording devices, forcing her to log back in sometimes more than 25 times a day. When she complained, she said, her bosses brushed it off as a minor technical issue, though some of her lighter-skinned colleagues told her they didn't have the same problem -- a common failing for some facial recognition systems, which have been shown to perform worse for people of color. So after each logout, Anidi gritted her teeth and did what she had to do: Re-scan her face from three angles so she could get back to a job where she was often expected to review 70 documents an hour.
"I want to be able to do the work and would love the money, but it's just that strain: I can't look left for too long, I can't look down, my dog can't walk by, or I get logged out," she said. "Then the company is looking at me like I'm the one delaying!" Facial recognition systems have become an increasingly common element of the rapid rise in work-from-home surveillance during the coronavirus pandemic. Employers argue that they offer a simple and secure way to monitor a scattered workforce. But for Anidi and other lawyers, they serve as a dehumanizing reminder that every second of their workday is rigorously probed and analyzed: After verifying their identity, the software judges their level of attention or distraction and kicks them out of their work networks if the system thinks they're not focused enough.
Contract attorneys such as Anidi have become some of America's first test subjects for this enhanced monitoring, and many are reporting frustrating results, saying the glitchy systems make them feel like a disposable cog with little workday privacy. But the software has also become a flash point for broader questions about how companies treat their remote workforces, especially those, like contract attorneys, whose short-term gigs limit their ability to push for change. The attorneys also worry that it could become the new norm as more jobs are automated and analyzed: If the same kinds of law firms that have litigated worker protections and labor standards are doing it, why wouldn't everyone else?
"I want to be able to do the work and would love the money, but it's just that strain: I can't look left for too long, I can't look down, my dog can't walk by, or I get logged out," she said. "Then the company is looking at me like I'm the one delaying!" Facial recognition systems have become an increasingly common element of the rapid rise in work-from-home surveillance during the coronavirus pandemic. Employers argue that they offer a simple and secure way to monitor a scattered workforce. But for Anidi and other lawyers, they serve as a dehumanizing reminder that every second of their workday is rigorously probed and analyzed: After verifying their identity, the software judges their level of attention or distraction and kicks them out of their work networks if the system thinks they're not focused enough.
Contract attorneys such as Anidi have become some of America's first test subjects for this enhanced monitoring, and many are reporting frustrating results, saying the glitchy systems make them feel like a disposable cog with little workday privacy. But the software has also become a flash point for broader questions about how companies treat their remote workforces, especially those, like contract attorneys, whose short-term gigs limit their ability to push for change. The attorneys also worry that it could become the new norm as more jobs are automated and analyzed: If the same kinds of law firms that have litigated worker protections and labor standards are doing it, why wouldn't everyone else?
I am so glad (Score:2, Insightful)
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I'd be out the door like a shot.
But if you are working from home ...
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Metaphor ... so hard to understand. :)
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is Metaphor the new Facebook name?
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is Metaphor the new Facebook name?
Close - you are thinking of
Meta for ?
Because no one knows.
then would walk back to office! (Score:2)
If working from home and walk away from job, would then end up at the office!
Do not work for (Score:2)
Do not plug yourself into the matrix.
This is inhumane technology. Do not put up with it. Specially as a a qualified attorney. Find something else ASAP.
This level of attention surveillance in no different than 19th century factory bosses staring down at hapless sweatshop workers and yelling or hitting them for non-compliance or chatting. Absurd. Do not participate.
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Specially as a a qualified attorney. Find something else ASAP.
The grass may not be greener elsewhere. Most lawyers spend long hours doing boring work. Most lawyers don't work from home. Surveillance sucks. Commuting for an hour to sit in a cubicle sucks more.
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Yeah but you might be willing to do it if you billed $400 an hour.
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No, a contract lawyer's client bills their client $400 an hour.
A contract lawyer can expect an average pay of $32.14/hr.
Re: I am so glad (Score:1)
Sure looks like slavery didn't go away in the United States of America in 1865.
Like the '80's and those stupid pagers. At least they flushed well.
And people wonder... (Score:5, Insightful)
... why it's so hard to get good employees.
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... why it's so hard to get good employees.
Well, to be fair, there's not that many good employees to start with, and the ones that are good-to-great are in high demand, won't tolerate this invasive bull excrement, and in general, are such a pleasure to have that if their present employers have even a lick of sense, they will generally do whatever they need to do to retain them.
Getting by with less than optimal employees is the secret skill in this challenging economic environment.
The Bantu Knot [federico.edu], for the curious.
Just say no.... (Score:3, Insightful)
They keep complaining about a worker shortage now ... but every one of these worker hostile moves should constitute valid reasons to walk off the job and look elsewhere. In a free market system, companies are all competing to have the best, more productive labor pool. So one of them pulling an unpopular stunt like this should be a catalyst for another to hire them away, since they DON'T use those tactics.
Say what you will about mandatory COVID vaccinations, but it's one more example of this. (See Southwest Airlines and how they had to recant on that mandate.)
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Say what you will about mandatory COVID vaccinations, but it's one more example of this. (See Southwest Airlines and how they had to recant on that mandate.)
Which is why the governmentshould do the mandates so that companies don't get the blame by some anti-vax kook. In the US at least, the states absolutely have power to do this, upheld by the supreme court (Zucht vs King, Jacobsen vs Massachusetts). One's right to not be vaccinated is superceded by the right of coworkers to have a safe working environment. Which is why so many of these "freedumb!" types are also believing that covid is a hoax or the vaccine is dangerous or whatnot, or have some fictitious r
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The religious exemption made sense with the pfizer shot which was the only one that had full FDA approval for a while.
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Well, it's still iffy. The Pope has said it's ok to get vaccinated with Pfizer, though many hardliners think he's a damned liberal commie. But it's not at all easy in any way to find any Bible verses or theology that will back up that viewpoint. Anti-abortion is much more cultural and political than theological; at least with Roman Catholics there is stronger theological basis for it, and against birth control, however the sola-scriptura protestants can't fall back on the authority of the church in this r
You keep using that word... (Score:2)
The religious exemption made sense...
Religious exception for people to act like plague rats is about as "sensible" as stoning people to death.
Or that part in the Bible where god uses Chewbacca defense to prove that he's right and THE god by referencing Hungry Hungry Hippos.
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I like the story about Lot giving his virgin daughters to the horny mob so they could be raped and "humbled".
Good times...
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It's hilarious to watch the evangelicals rail about how they won't let something invisible control their lives.
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I find it hilarious you are pro murder but want everyone vaccinated.
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I find it hilarious you are pro murder but want everyone vaccinated.
I find it hilarious you think I'm pro murder.
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Well, I'd argue that viewpoint is absolutely misguided. Vaccines are for the benefit of the people getting them, just like any other medical treatment is. If you fear your co-workers are putting you at risk because THEY chose not to get vaccinated? Nobody's stopping you from doing so yourself, AND certainly nobody is stopping you from taking all the other precautions available to you such as sanitizing your work area, wearing a mask, maintaining a distance from others, etc.
Some people with various immune
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Vaccines are also for the benefit of the community. Cut down on the spread. That's the real disease in America, not giving a crap about your neighbors, if you get vaccinated, who cares about others... And if someone has issues such that they cannot be vaccinated, then that's all the more reason to have those around these people be vaccinated. Vaccine mandates do NOT require everyone to be vaccinated, just have a better excuse than some lame conspiracy theory.
perform worse for people of color so get fired sue (Score:2)
perform worse for people of color so get fired & sue for $$$
Solution (Score:4, Interesting)
Stop changing your activity (not turning left, avoiding pet), continue to log back in, get nothing accomplished, then sue for discrimination if they reprimand you for performance.
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And keep a log of every time it happens.
Simple solution (Score:3, Funny)
All she has to do is let one of her young children walk through the room butt-ass naked, and then she can have everyone on the other end of that video feed arrested for child porn, including the remote sensing company analysts. instant promotion...
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Nudity is not pornography most places in the US. Usually pornography requires the explicit display of the genitals or the depiction of a sex act.
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Ya but not on social media. And most of those coworkers are likely more scared of a social media backlash than having to go to court and be found non guilty. Nothing is going to rile up the public faster than a child porn accusation.
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Contract Attorneys (Score:3)
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If contract attorneys are the ones who defend workers . . .
I was wondering about this too. In my experience, attorneys are the ones who defend whoever is paying them with no particularly innate allegiance to either side. Although some might find it more profitable to specialize in certain types of cases . . . until the economics change then they're just as likely to be vigorously defending their previous adversaries.
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My initial parse of "contract lawyers" was "specialists in contract law", but right at the end of the summary it says
I now suspect that it's a bizarre abbreviation for "lawyers on temporary contracts" by someone who didn't stop to ask whether it would be open to other, more compelling, interpretations. And, naturally, /. editors wouldn't stoop to editing a summary to make it more intelligible. It would be bad for the
What the hell? (Score:3)
Re:What the hell? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds like she/her bosses are okay with riding the grey line of being fraudsters anyways. No one can review an average of 70 documents an hour, more than 1 per minute, with even the faintest critical eye. If they/she are charging their full rate to review documents with that level of scrutiny then they are a bunch of crooks.
(In case ya'll crooks are reading, please note this is only my opinion and not a statement of fact).
Measuring the wrong thing (Score:3)
She is expected to review 70 documents per hour. This might sound crazy, but how about oh... I dunno... CHECKING TO MAKE SURE SHE REVIEWED 70 DOCUMENTS PER HOUR.
But what does that even mean? Here. I reviewed all her documents. It might seem obvious that I lied here, but within the context of her job how do you tell if a document was reviewed or not? This suggests to me that the job might be bullshit on some level, except that there could be a mistake in a document that might cost the company money. "The party of the first part shall not", except that the "not" wasn't supposed to be there and everybody working on the case would know that.
Really it seems like it shouldn't even be about how many documents you review per hour, but about whether or not there's a consensus the documents are in order. Should one person be responsible? A contractor? You get what you pay for. Trust but verify, but simply doing so based on how long your eyes are on the page seems silly. I know next to nothing about law. I could stare blankly at 70 docs per hour, no problem for the kind of money they're probably making. It doesn't mean I did anything, which once again gets back to my original point:
They're measuring the wrong thing.
Re:Measuring the wrong thing (Score:5, Insightful)
It is impossible to review 70 documents/hour with any kind of detail / complexity. What's going on is that the company is charging customers a (large) fee, and then trying to get the work done as cheaply as possible. The difference is pure profit. I wouldn't want anything to do with this firm, either as a client or an employee.
If some critical detail was present in one of the documents, at 70 documents/hour, the detail will be missed.
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I'd guess she's not expected to review them in their entirety or in any comprehensive way.
There's probably some subset of the document that she actually reviews. I'd also guess there's either some minor legal knowledge required for the review or there's some other compelling reason (law, legal precedence, liability, etc) that causes them to need a "lawyer" to review them.
I know a lawyer who worked on a contract basis during the pandemic for both Thomson Reuters and Discover Financial Services and neither e
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> It is impossible to review 70 documents/hour with any kind of detail / complexity.
A title company I once worked for, NextAce, did far more than that. 3 Human reviewers reviewed up to a thousand documents a day. Some documents are trivially easy to review. Say the document is blank? Say the document has 1 page that's a declaration from 2002 in the state of CA? Might as well be blank for the purposes of title establishment. et al.
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Depends on what she's reviewing them for. For example, when I was a baby lawyer, I spent a ton of time on discovery review. I had to review tons of documents (the vast majority of which were emails) for materials that were protected by attorney/client privilege. Totally mind numbing, but you could crank through huge amounts of material per hour with a high degree of accuracy.
Re:Measuring the wrong thing (Score:5, Insightful)
They're measuring the wrong thing.
At the beginning of lockdown and working from home, my boss was quite clear about keeping tabs on people's working hours. We get paid for the results we achieve, and not for putting in the hours. If I can get my work done in just four hours a day, then that is enough to justify my salary. My boss realised pretty soon that many aspects of the daily office grind are horribly inefficient. As he put it, he wasted hours "commuting between two computers".
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Your boss sounds cool. I was at a place once with semi-annuals. It wasn't ideal in other ways, but at least that aspect was good. Your manager sees you every working day (or in Covid times, interacts electronically) so when it's time for review they have a list of goods and bads. Semi-annual eval is not broken for salaried employees, and yet I've heard stories of some crazy things flying by managers who didn't even do that. Yes--there's crazy under-management which is the counter-part of over-managemen
Does anyone know what the system even is? (Score:2)
It's a pain enough to graft in 2FA to VPN systems if you're not using the current vendor's baked-in preferred VPN system. I can't even imagine the overhead and bullshit to bake in a facial recognition type system.
Who does this? Who thinks this adds in some meaningful level of productivity enhancement or supervision, or at least enough to justify the $$$,$$$ price tag of use and support?
Lawyer? (Score:2)
Sweatshops (Score:2)
Privacy is gone (Score:1)
Oh... (Score:1)
I SO sorry to hear that. Now, how do we get the same thing applied to government bureaucrats, elected officials, and staff?
Lawyers? (Score:2)
Then, they can sue their employers! ;)
A Family of Lawyers (Score:1)
I have suffered much from attorneys, especially the ones that inhabit the legislature, for so long and over so many issues that I tend to ignore their complaints. I recognized that they are people too! And have the same desires and goals that I have. I recognize that individual attorneys are also individual persons. I know that they need the same things that I do. I know that many, hopefully most, attorneys are striving to help people an