Post: #1

As some of you know, I started a business a while back. Recently I hired my first employee.

He needs an extra phone to perform his job well. It's in his contract that his employer (me) can monitor any activities he performs on company devices. The only problem is that I don't have experience with this.

Can somebody with experience direct me to an Android app that sits in the background (is not visible) and allows me to monitor this phone remotely?

Post: #2

That's just wrong, he's your employee, not your property. Once he gets the job done what concern is it of yours what he does on the phone? You sound like a pain in the ass, glad l don't work for you.

Post: #3

I can see this being useful if you need to fire an SJW employee causing problems. Maybe.

But ultimately seems like a waste of time and illegal (especially if you don't have g'ment backing)

G

Post: #4

Now imagine you were him and your boss is a feminist sjw etc. They saw you logged onto rvf during your lunchtime using wifi. Right away you'd be counting your days until you are replaced as you are now to them a mysogynist, racist, bigot whatever name they will label you. etc.

Don't become them. They are looking for a big brother police state.

You gotta have a sense of proportion. If they use the phone here and there for personal reasons who cares. As macqueen says if they complete their work then who cares. If you need to help them with sales or whatever, you can look through their messages to clients together and coach him/her to improve.

Have some trust in your employees. Don't go down the micro manager / big brother path.

Post: #5

I would agree that it shouldn't be needed as long as he gets the work done, obviously, you don't want to be sneaky, but I'm sure some other good arguments could be made.
Who knows what could happen in the future where you might have wished you had something installed just so you could check something.

I would probably also install that before I handed it over because it's going to be a bit harder to install it afterwards and if you regret or so no point in it, you can just stop using it.

It was a while I looked into something like this and I suppose that easiest is just to just buy a spy service if you don't know exactly what you're doing. As far as I know, the free programs rarely monitor different apps and stuff. But I did a couple of Google searches and found this one: https://xnspy.com/features/key-logger.html

Many of these companies have online customer service where you could ask them about questions about how it works. But there are plenty of others.

Post: #6

To clarify my initial post: it's essential that I can monitor his work because part of his job is to communicate with stakeholders. It's standard practice to monitor all this communication. When I worked in this industry as an employee, it was exactly the same. It helped me a great deal because my bosses back then used this to give me feedback and I drastically improved because of this.

I don't care about his personal life. The reason I asked it here is that my setup is slightly different from the one of my former employer. I'm giving my employee an Android phone, he is not in a closed computer network in an office. I figured this might be the place to ask since some guys on here have some experience installing software like this on the phone of their girlfriend.

Post: #7

(11-22-2018 05:29 PM)asdfk Wrote:  it's essential that I can monitor his work because part of his job is to communicate with stakeholders. It's standard practice to monitor all this communication.

Maybe just have him forward communication that he has with stakeholders to you whenever you ask for it?

Post: #8

You want to record all his calls and communications, with his permission, for training and "quality", aka contract agreement purposes, yes?

Post: #9

If he is only using this phone for his job you definitely should do some kind of monitoring and tell him up front that the phone is business only and you are monitoring it. I do this with employees computers, and anyone who disagrees with the practice probably has never had any employee or ran any type of business. The advanced computer programs will give you pie charte breakdowns of productive/unproductive, show idle time, and show which sites they visit the most.

Post: #10

Sounds fucked up.

You can't just have weekly performance meetings with him?

Post: #11

Lol guys this is not an ethics issue. Say you're monitoring work coms on a work phone to your employee, make them sign, let them know it's just to give feedback and make sure if a customer/peer complains you can have your employees back. Be a man and keep your word. Also it's a work phone the company owns to conduct business for the company using company assets with company clients. As far as I'm concerned I'd give dude a pass for not saying anything at all.

As for apps that purely run in the background you may have to look into rooting android and possibly getting a custom android ROM. I think blackhatforums may be better suited for this question. I haven't done this I know a little about the platform.

Post: #12

When you don't trust him, why hire him? Give him the trust and freedom, make sure you set him clear goals to reach. Numbers that he has to match that you can check. Also when he does something wrong, you and he should be sure that you get to know about it.
In general, over controlling is a huge demotivation. When you hire the right people, make their tasks clear, have some check numbers to see if they are on track then you should already hired a person that want to do this job. If he mess up, you did hire the wrong person.

- Specify what should your employee exactly do?
- How are the resources and time that he can achieve that?
- Set feedback and check numbers / targets that he has to reach.

In the beginning when you don't know the person nor his performance its normal to check more, but over controlling. I believe, when you make clear what you expect in a job / task and hire the right people, you don't have any motivation issues. Even more, all this motivation stuff don't work if the person don't want because its not the right fit for this job.
Weekly meetings / check the numbers should give you an impression if he is on track.

Post: #13

(11-22-2018 02:37 PM)Steve McQueen Wrote:  

(11-22-2018 01:09 PM)asdfk Wrote:  As some of you know, I started a business a while back. Recently I hired my first employee.

He needs an extra phone to perform his job well. It's in his contract that his employer (me) can monitor any activities he performs on company devices. The only problem is that I don't have experience with this.

Can somebody with experience direct me to an Android app that sits in the background (is not visible) and allows me to monitor this phone remotely?

That's just wrong, he's your employee, not your property. Once he gets the job done what concern is it of yours what he does on the phone? You sound like a pain in the ass, glad l don't work for you.

Not only this is not wrong at all but it's also written in the contract so the employee is warned...

Not understanding this is not being able to be a Boss, as it is your job to control people that work for you effectively to do the best they can to bring more money in your pocket.
Doing the job doesn't mean being trustworthy...

At least, OP won't be crying about his employee ruining him by making multiple hours long international phone calls.

Now for OP's concern, you either create an apk with metasploit [Source] or you pay someone (spying firm) to install one of theirs for you.

Post: #14

If you're transparent and it's in the contract that you can monitor activities, why do it secretly? At least that's what I'm assuming since you want it to run in the background and be invisible?

Post: #15

(11-22-2018 01:09 PM)asdfk Wrote:  As some of you know, I started a business a while back. Recently I hired my first employee.

He needs an extra phone to perform his job well. It's in his contract that his employer (me) can monitor any activities he performs on company devices. The only problem is that I don't have experience with this.

Can somebody with experience direct me to an Android app that sits in the background (is not visible) and allows me to monitor this phone remotely?

Wow. While this may be in a legal and ethical gray zone, simply stated I and many others I know wouldn't put up with it, so you'll essentially be paying more for the same person so they will put up with it, or end up with desperate people who need the work and will agree to anything.

The bulk of my employment was with a F500 Oil Field Service company as an engineer, and their attitude was "You're smart people. That's why we hired you. There is absolutely zero blocks on your computer, we trust you know what is and is not acceptable. Make sure you get your job done." To that end there were no hours, and you had certain things you just needed to get done. Fuck around for 2 hours on facebook? Fine but that just delays you leaving by 2 hours since the same shit still needs to get done.

It sounds like you aren't playing to win, but rather playing to make sure the other guy doesn't win.

As others said why not just get him to forward any communications he has with clients? If he uses it to check his personal email who really cares. And not sure about the laws, but keylogging software might delve into the realm of illegal, as you'd essentially be getting all his passwords, banking info, access to literally all of him most private accounts. Just as you can't waive your right to be paid minimum wage, this may fall in there as well.

Post: #16

Try a paid appwlike mspy or spyzie

Post: #17

You'll need an MDM (mobile device management) solution where you tie the device's admin access to your local exchange or LDAP server.

You can already audit his emails by simply being an admin of your business, phone calls will be a lot more difficult since you run into the whole both or single parties call recording rules.

A proper MDM solution will be too expensive for you right now given your size and recording calls on an android phone in the field is even costlier.

My suggestion: Learn to trust your employee. If he can't talk to stakeholders move him to inside sales and set appointments. Or better yet, shadow him to the point where you can trust those to delegate tasks.

You can't run a large business by yourself.

Post: #18

Thanks for the suggestions. I'm looking into them now. Does anybody have experience with the paid apps mentioned?

As to the trust / ethics issue: me monitoring his communication is part of the agreement and is the standard procedure in this industry. He knows the phone he receives will be monitored. And yeah, I could care less about any personal stuff he might do on it. (Although I assume he won't)

Post: #19

You can't keylog unless you root your android. Give me $800 and I set it up.

Post: #20

You should tell him that he's being monitored. It'll make him a better worker. Not sure which keylogger program to use. It seems weird if you do it and don't tell him. I don't think it's illegal but I think it sends the wrong message if you don't tell him.

I regularly get observed as a teacher. I actually enjoy it. I get to show off that I'm the best teacher they've ever had and ever will have.

Post: #21

Maybe in the very small country of Ireland they don't have company computers and phones, but this is nearly 100% standard practice at every company I have been associated with and the companies of every person I know. There is nothing "shady" or "wrong" about it, it is always clearly spelled out and known. What you do on company devices is monitored. That's just the way it is if you work for someone else and use their computers and phones.

Personally I don't like being the subject of such monitoring, or other intrusions or control, so I no longer work for someone else.

Post: #22

On one hand, it is standard practice is many industries that your phones can be monitored, but it's not standard that managers actually look into this kind of thing regularly, it's usually only for if theres a complaint or something.

Also, you have to consider that if you look, you are then responsible too, even if you dont take action. If hes getting his job done well, ignorance may be preferable. Imagine going to court and having te finger pointed at you because you saw something that you decided not to make a big deal out of and not take action. This could backfire on you.