According to the Gallup State of the Global Workplace: 2023 Report, worker stress is at an all-time high. While other issues related to the pandemic have subsided, stress is causing trouble for organizations, especially those with remote workers, where it is harder to spot issues. Where there is stress, there is risk. Employees make more mistakes and are more likely to intentionally create other problems for employers.

March 2023 marks approximately three years since the world shut down at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. Since then, organizations have seen their workforce change considerably. What was originally a short term plan to work from home has become ingrained in our new work culture. According to a recent LinkedIn poll, at-home work is ticking back up. Only 50% of workers are in the office full-time, the rest work from home full-time or have a hybrid schedule.

Many companies are concerned by the uptick in insider risk that’s come with the work-from-home boom. By one estimate, 58% of office workers work from home at least one day a week. This trend creates blind spots for companies. Managers see their employees less often, people work off network and on personal devices, and they keep schedules that don’t adhere to the previous more predictable hours.

Elizabeth Harz, CEO of Veriato, gave an interview to ISMG at this year’s RSA Conference in San Francisco. In it, Elizabeth covers the challenges of maintaining data security in the remote or hybrid workforce environment and the rising cost of data breaches. She also discusses some of the tools and solutions and can help businesses better manage their cybersecurity challenges.

Also known as “bossware” and even “employee surveillance”, employee monitoring has been placed in the bucket of technologies that companies force on their employees. Whatever you call it, its use is on the rise and it looks like it’s here to stay. As of 2022, 60% of companies use some kind of software to monitor employees. General productivity isn’t the only justification for implementing employee monitoring.