Honestly dial up modems won’t work at my company either. We have converted everything to voice over IP and removed the phones lines so there are none to plug into.
I cannot speak for other Network Admins but I can tell you that I don’t do any of the crap mentioned in this thread like black mailing anyone. It’s my job on the line as well and I do it honestly and correctly. I run reports every week dealing with people’s internet usage and I turn them in unaltered. If they did something they should not have then it’s on the report. It’s up to the people above me to deal with that. It’s my job to monitor not to punish the guilty. Most of it is a mute point as far as going to inappropriate sites because they are blocked in the first place including forums and chat rooms etc. This not only protects the company but in a way protects the end users job. If they cannot get to it then it can’t get them in trouble.
Our monitoring is not out to bust people for going to places that they should not as much as it is for to monitor worker efficiency. We don’t pay people to cruise the Internet and if you want to do that you can do it from the privacy of your own home and not on our time. It’s also there to protect the company from not only lawsuits but things such as viruses. We don’t even allow web based email for those specific reasons.
I work for a bank and there are also certain regulations that we are required to follow. Thanks to other companies like Enron we not only have to monitor user Internet usage but we keep track of all emails and store them. Every user is required to sign a form that informs them of everything that we do so they are aware of it. We have no choice but to follow regulations and we will and the end users are completely aware of it. If they decide to not follow policy then that’s their choice and they will pay the consequences for their actions.
Don’t judge all Network Admins by some bad apples in the bunch. Some of us do our job simple as that.
