The monitoring practices and rationales of an ideal-typical company are described. The implications of current surveillance trends for social control and deviance at work are discussed. The often unintended and ironic outcomes of inappropriate monitoring must be understood if we are to have a society which is both productive and just, and in which the story of Dr. Frankenstein remains just a story. He also measures a lot that doesn't move. In its extreme form such a society is transparent and porous.
Information leakage is rampant.
Indeed it is hemorrhaging, as traditional boundaries weaken or disappear. Actions, as well as feelings, thoughts, pasts, and even futures are made visible, often independent of the individual's will or knowledge. Data in many different forms, from widely separated geographical areas, organizations, and time periods can easily be merged and analyzed. They touch us as citizens, consumers, patients, parents, children and friends and of course as workers. We are increasingly both watched and the watcher.