Why YSK: It appears several Lemmy Instances are flagged as suspicious and at least 1 instance intentionally using the name of ransomware. A couple of the big enterprise monitoring suites (Fortiguard, ZScaler) will flag your account and may end up with you being pulled into an office for an explanation, or worse.

TL;DR: Keep browsing to your local instance at work for now.

-2 points

That’s why you use the guest WIFI

permalink
report
reply
62 points

No! If you’re doing personal stuff use your cell phone data. Do not use work Wi-Fi, do not use the work network, use your cell phones personal cell phone data plan. Do not transit personal stuff over the corporate network. It will be logged it will be monitored and there may be questions.

At the very least have your phone use a VPN if you’re going to use the Wi-Fi.

permalink
report
parent
reply
16 points

This is also managed by IT and is fully traceable as well.

I have unlimited data on my cell and just stay off WiFi altogether. The price premium is worth it to me for this one specific reason alone, let alone the other benefits/convenience.

Source: work in IT.

permalink
report
parent
reply
8 points

Don’t use work computer or networks for personal use. Zero benefits really and at least some risk.

permalink
report
parent
reply

Better idea… you could work. Or use a VPN on your phone.

permalink
report
reply
-2 points
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points

Doesn’t stop the network from seeing what you’re doing

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points

Working is stupid

permalink
report
parent
reply
1 point

Tell me how else I’m supposed to afford food and a place to live!

permalink
report
parent
reply
1 point
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points

Just make sure your parents are billionaires.

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points

That’s why it’s stupid.

permalink
report
parent
reply
6 points

Yeah better not take a break and use the phone while on it.

permalink
report
parent
reply

By all means, please do. IT departments can look for this type of traffic and report it to HR, which saves the company money.

I find it funny that people seem to think that browsing reddit at work is ok, as long as it’s not porn. I don’t think employers see it that way.

permalink
report
parent
reply
0 points
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
7 points

Or just use LTE and not Company WiFi which is obviously monitored. Like how dumb is OP lol

permalink
report
parent
reply

Yeah that would also work.

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply

The Tony Danza you seek is in another castle…

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points

Working at work. Psshh

permalink
report
parent
reply
26 points

Well, you should be using a VPN for privacy anyway, so that wouldn’t be a problem.

permalink
report
reply
27 points
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points

Unless you’re handing your phone over and letting them root it, they almost certainly are not MITMing your traffic. At best, they can see you’re using a VPN. If they are able to snoop your traffic, either your VPN is absolutely shit, or you changed some setting you shouldn’t have and fucked yourself.

permalink
report
parent
reply
5 points

So if you were, say, using a VPN on your personal phone at work on their internet, would you also get in trouble?

permalink
report
parent
reply
4 points

Why would you join your phone to the company wifi? Mobile data is cheap (at least where I am). I’ve never joined my personal phone to an employer’s wifi. At least not in the last five or so years.

permalink
report
parent
reply
5 points

If it’s a personal device, at worst they would see you are using a VPN and maybe ask what’s up with that, but they can’t mitm you on your own device.

permalink
report
parent
reply

Most probably not. Unless you’ve installed custom root certificate provided by them. (which you most probably didn’t)

permalink
report
parent
reply
14 points
*

Its worth noting, you cant actually MITM most traffic without device acess. To MITM my lemmy traffic, you would need either a copy of the certificate and private key of for example lemmy.world, which they would never willingly provide, or you would need to get a valid certificate from a CA for lemmy.world, which you could never get without verifying ownership of the domain.

If you are using a company owned device to browse Lemmy, then 100% they can very easily install a custom Root CA and make their own certificates, and you should assume all your traffic is monitored. But if they allow BYOB or for your phone to be on the network, then they would be unable to see that traffic without you being able to tell, because you would get certificate errors.

But if they allow you to install a VPN, then just use TOR with a TOR bridge and you wouldnt have issues, because they cant tell its VPN / TOR traffic akaik

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points

omg people, dont do personal stuff on your work machine or connected to your work network. A vpn wont save you from all the software they install in your machine to track you. Use your phone with your mobile data.

permalink
report
parent
reply
35 points

Do you guys not have phones?

permalink
report
parent
reply
32 points

My phone is exclusively used to play Diablo

permalink
report
parent
reply
5 points

Ah yes I understand this reference.

permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points

You put a VPN on your company phone?

permalink
report
parent
reply
19 points

You’re using personal software like Lemmy on your company phone?

permalink
report
parent
reply
1 point

No, I was asking if you did

permalink
report
parent
reply
17 points

I find it crazy that you can get in trouble for browsing the wrong websites. It’s illegal where I live to track people’s computers.

permalink
report
reply
7 points

Ain’t your hardware and/or network

permalink
report
parent
reply
1 point
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
11 points

In the US there is no reasonable expectation of privacy on company computers and company networks and to reinforce this usually on day 1 of a job you sign documents explicitly stating they can and will monitor traffic on company systems.

Without monitoring traffic on all company systems there would be no way to know if your company was subjected to a breach. There is mandatory reporting for public companies and part of the reporting includes the capability to monitor for said breaches.

To that end I have to wonder where you are that information security is basically prohibited by law.

permalink
report
parent
reply
27 points

If you’re using company hardware on a company network and our security software says you’re visiting ransomware like URLs, it’s very much legal monitoring as it’s for a technical reason. It’s probably mandatory since you need to do this to protect the personal data your company stores.

More often than not you probably signed a document stating you understood and accepted this.

permalink
report
parent
reply
12 points

Just a distinction: It’s most-likely a laptop issued by the company, not a personal computer.

permalink
report
parent
reply
42 points
*

I imagine the socialist/ML and pro-union content also plays into this (speaking as a socialist/ML and extremely pro-union, mind you). Corporations hate and are terrified of any sort of dissidence that threatens their profits and will absolutely police your activity on it. Weirdly enough Western “freedom of speech” doesn’t seem to extend to this kind of stuff in practice, can’t imagine why.

permalink
report
reply
29 points

More likely op being a dumbass and using work resources to fuck around on the clock.

permalink
report
parent
reply
0 points
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
17 points
*

I do. I also competently complete all the work that’s given to me and then some. I’m being paid to do a job and I do it well. If I’m not engaged in work and caught up I’m going to discretely “fuck around” while still being on hand for anything that needs me.

That’s what most jobs are: you’re paid to complete specific tasks and be available for when something comes up.

Oh, I could be doing more work? – I’d love to … for more pay or time off. The expectation of “looking busy” and “busy work” is for jackasses, and I don’t work for free.

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points
*
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
parent
reply
7 points

Given that I can literally access my unions resources from my employers internet, I doubt that’s an issue.

permalink
report
parent
reply

Could it be that in your country your employer is required by law, or there exists an union contract that specifies your right to access this information?

permalink
report
parent
reply
6 points

it couldnt be, we just established that “Western “freedom of speech” doesn’t seem to extend to this kind of stuff in practice”

permalink
report
parent
reply
16 points

The company firewall very likely is using a “content filtering” function which for Sonicwall, for example, is a subscription service where the admin can select any number of “categories” of content to block. I found lemmy.world was being blocked because Sonicwall had that domain categorized as “gaming” which was disallowed. I reported the error to Sonicwall that it should be “social media” but haven’t heard back (it takes a while) but some companies might block that category also. In short, it might not be blocked because of any positive action by your company but instead by accident because whoever first classified the site didn’t understand what it was.

permalink
report
parent
reply
13 points
*

I’m less worried about what they actively block with an in-your-face “this content is forbidden” screen and more worried about what they might silently flag to my supervisor, tbh. They’re unlikely to block pro-union content, for example, but might silently track who’s going on those kinds of sites.

permalink
report
parent
reply
6 points

Your personal security concerns are valid but every company is different, and it seems most people don’t work at a firm their whole lives anymore so there is less trust and less loyalty and decency, really. In my case the wifi given to employees for their personal phones is totally segregated from the work LAN so while it is definitely monitored and protected in the same way, its far less of a concern for company security. It is also throttled so watching videos is almost impossible, it blocks a hoard of malicious stuff (which makes using it safer for the user than when they leave), and many of those using it are on cheap limited plans so they might not be able to leave their comms open to their family or check the location of their kids during the workday, or even get updates otherwise. Many use it to stream radio stations or listen to podcasts usually into earbuds. Properly classified porn sites, etc. are blocked. However, I recently heard there will be changes imposed on us from above and all these users may soon be kicked off this wifi entirely. Managers and office workers will certainly be still allowed to use it but the people who really need it? I guess they are SOL.

permalink
report
parent
reply
4 points

Yea, and the filters are not that accurate either.

Tried to login into Telegram at work, and it was blocked for terrorism lmao.

Gave me a scare, but never got a talking to about it.

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points

The only people to know about it would be IT, if we even have an alert for it (we generally don’t) because we don’t care about someone trying to access something is blocked, we know its blocked so its no threat. Things we care about are real security concerns like when your machine suddenly is downloading a bunch of exe files, connecting to a database server in Brazil, scanning the network for open file shares and running powershell scripts to encrypt every file it finds. Most well-set-up places are running endpoint protection now though so the first thing you’ll notice is you will lose your internet. THEN you might get visited, but by then you’ll probably be calling us since nothing works LOL

permalink
report
parent
reply

You Should Know

!youshouldknow@lemmy.world

Create post

YSK - for all the things that can make your life easier!

The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:

Rules (interactive)


Rule 1- All posts must begin with YSK.

All posts must begin with YSK. If you’re a Mastodon user, then include YSK after @youshouldknow. This is a community to share tips and tricks that will help you improve your life.



Rule 2- Your post body text must include the reason "Why" YSK:

**In your post’s text body, you must include the reason “Why” YSK: It’s helpful for readability, and informs readers about the importance of the content. **



Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.

Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.



Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.

That’s it.



Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.

Posts and comments which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.



Rule 6- Regarding non-YSK posts.

Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-YSK posts using the [META] tag on your post title.



Rule 7- You can't harass or disturb other members.

If you harass or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.

If you are a member, sympathizer or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.

For further explanation, clarification and feedback about this rule, you may follow this link.



Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content.

Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.

Let everyone have their own content.



Rule 10- The majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here.

Unless included in our Whitelist for Bots, your bot will not be allowed to participate in this community. To have your bot whitelisted, please contact the moderators for a short review.



Partnered Communities:

You can view our partnered communities list by following this link. To partner with our community and be included, you are free to message the moderators or comment on a pinned post.

Community Moderation

For inquiry on becoming a moderator of this community, you may comment on the pinned post of the time, or simply shoot a message to the current moderators.

Credits

Our icon(masterpiece) was made by @clen15!

Community stats

  • 4.7K

    Monthly active users

  • 368

    Posts

  • 13K

    Comments