Hey there!  I'm Alix Shadonnay at the business desk and today I'd like to focus a bit on a recent article that I came across in the New York Times re the concern over data transfer.

It appears that more and more companies are becoming concerned over the ability of their employees to illegally transfer company data and in a survey published last week it was revealed that about 40% of American managers have placed a ban on laptops being used at work and about 30% of them have placed a similar ban on MP3's.  I know that the whole topic of data transfer is a big problem and concern for companies of all sizes and with the increase in such things as identity theft, company secrets, and overall concerns over data security, it can easily be understood why companies are feeling this way.  Many experts are saying that the one way to tackle this and decrease concern over the whole concern of illegal transfer of data is to indeed closely monitor and limit the use of such types of devices that will at least tempt the employee to transfer data.  Devices such as laptops, MP3's, and any other type of hand held device would need to be closely monitored re their uses in the workplace.

However, I would caution that such monitoring and limitation could easily lead to mistrust on the part of employees, uncertainty in the workplace among employees, and most of all mistrust and uncertainty between employees and managers.  For example, employees may feel that managers are watching over them to see how they're using their laptops at work, and in the same manner employees may start to pay more attention to those managers who sit at their desks using their laptops.  The whole issue of potential illegal data transfer is a very dicey affair and needs to be handled with kid gloves.  There are many employees who use laptops at work to download info from the Internet for their own personal use and this in itself is extremely harmless but how is anyone to know this?  In the same light a manager may be sitting at his desk doing some personal stuff on his laptop and an employee happens to pass by and sees him/her working away.  Is it right for him to assume that this manager is doing something illegal?

Whatever the outcome of this concern, whatever the potential ramifications, this whole affair needs to be closely examined, all the ramifications fully discussed, and both sides re employees and employers should be brought into the discussion over how companies should go about initiating and developing policies on illegal data transfer.

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