She had interviewed and met both remotely and in person, this guy was merely an HR drone confirming her documentation. I was a little bent when she told me he had asked her to remove her blur filter “to have a look at her working environment, make sure it’s not cluttered” (something along those lines). No one else at this company requested such. Was he way out of line?
I should note, this is my PC in our living room and not where she will be working from. And this guy wants a look around our home?! Told my wife to bring this up once she’s settled in, ask HR if this is policy. She started today!
She thinks it’s a racism thing. I’m not so sure, but I don’t have any other explanation.
Uh, I hire a lot of remote people, and have been remote for a long time. That is absolutely not fucking normal. I’m not going to say racism/poor/or anything, but I will say asshole behavior and huge red flag.
I’ve been remote the past 5 years as well. I’ve never heard of anyone, anywhere, for any reason being asked to un-blur video. Customers, vendors, coworkers, everyone does it. In fact, I consider it more professional, and certainly less distracting to do so unless you background is 100% work dedicated. Hence my post.
okay but consider that you don’t have as much surveilance of your employees, and without that, how are you supposed to discipline them?
Just checking, youre being sarcastic right?
I was riffing on the original and translated titles of foucault’s most well known work. whether it was sarcasm or not; 🤷♀️
I agree! I brought this up with my team and they all laughed at it, and brought up too that “Wouldn’t it look more professional having it on?”
Even in a 100% work dedicated office, there is no background that looks as professional and uncluttered as a blurred one.
I only unblur if I’m showing off my bookshelf or video game posters
I only leave my stuff unblurred cuz my cats like to be on cam.
My cat will get in front of me on camera, so blurring wouldn’t even do anything
It sure sounds like racism and poorphobia to me. HR trying to make sure her surroundings don’t look like what a “typical poor person” would have (clutter, children, signs of disability, “drugs”, etc.) It’s not super common, but it’s common enough that I hear about it every so often.
I can’t offer any kind of legal advice, but it sounds like this job will be potentially problematic and HR will definitely be one to watch out for.
ETA: There’s a lot of paranoia in the US right now about “laptop farms”. Remote jobs are paranoid about people getting remote work to send money back to North Korea. It’s completely ridiculous, and it’s causing issues for a lot of people, mostly marginalized people. I think it’s useful context to know why this kind of thing is happening more lately.
This could be raised as discrimination. Not only regarding income, but could also be against disabilities. People with ADHD (hello it’s me!) are really bad at organizing, especially desks and work areas (I work in layers of papers like sedimentation). I would definitely take notes on this incident and if it continues or if he job gets changed following.
Definitely! However if your first experience with HR is being discriminated against, raising concerns about discrimination can be dangerous. Who do you go to when HR is causing the issues? HR is there to protect the company, not you. If the easiest way to protect the company is to fire someone, HR will probably do that.
I’m not trying to talk OP or anyone else out of going to HR, they aren’t always sharks waiting to fire someone. It’s just good to be careful here and OP and their wife should be aware of the risks before taking any action. Definitely document this incident. If this becomes a repeat issue, documentation can be the difference between getting fired and winning a wrongful termination lawsuit.
That’s why I said keep notes. Recount the event with timestamp. If things continue or get worse you now have a file with all occurrences. And if you get fired for calling out HR, that’s an easy lawsuit.
HR can protect the company by reigning this guy in. I really feel it was a lone wolf thing, not policy.
I’d like to approach them anonymously, but it might be obvious who I was talking about.
HR can protect the company by reigning this guy in. I really feel it was a lone wolf thing, not policy.
Very true! Like I said, I’m not trying to convince you to not bring it up, just that it’s something to be careful about, and to make sure you have evidence or documentation.
I would suggest unionizing and talking to a union rep
Agreed. Unfortunately a lot of people don’t have a union, and sometimes unionizing just isn’t possible.
Ah the sedimentary filing system. I can tell you exactly when I last touched each layer of each pile and what’s there but if I file it all away somewhere I can’t tell you shit.
My wife moves my personal piles around and royally jacks me up. As to work, I’m much more organized because of deadline and customer expectations.
If I hadn’t seen the blatant discrimination she’s faced job hunting, I’d be more skeptical. She’s Filipino, but that’s “Mexican” to many. When I say blatant, I mean to say heads would roll if we had some of this on camera. She’s mostly unhurt by these things, just figures that’s the way of the world. But damn. One lady asked if she was Asian and was visibly appalled. Another said she would have to attend their church, and barely stopped short of asking her to renounce Catholicism. There’s much more I’m not remembering ATM.
What’s shocking is that this employer is widely considered to be the best in the whole area. Solid pay and benefits, really cares about their people. My ex-wife worked there and loved them. I’m guessing their HR folks would have kittens if they knew this guy had pulled this.
Also, just read your edit, makes much more sense. Still, I would have said, “This is not where I will be working. If you want to pick this back up in 5, I can be in my home office.” (We hadn’t set up proper video cam or setup the laptop so I had her use my machine.)
Having said that, this is a hybrid position, so the laptop farm shouldn’t be an issue. She’ll be in 3 times a week.
I completely believe all of that, and I’m sorry she’s had to deal with so much crap. Lately a lot of employers seem to be showing their asses by being overtly racist, ableist, and transphobic. Everyone I know who isn’t a white straight cis man has had employment troubles in the last six months.
I hope this is just a strange interaction with one HR person and you have a better time with everyone else!
There was a big headline recently about a tech company accidentally hiring a North Korean “hacker” (I’m just going off the headline) so that might be fresh in memory with regards to your laptop farm reference.
Exactly what I was referencing! I’ve known a few people who were recently fired from remote jobs under very strange circumstances. I can’t prove anything of course, but I distinctly got the feeling that they were fired because the intersection of their marginalizations made them look like “evil North Korean spies” to management.
That was knowbe4, a fairly large player in the information technology security game, failing to vet its own employees and potentially exposing its customers to a foreign hacker.
“Sorry, this is a shared office and my partner is working under NDA”
No such thing as an NDA that allows a spouse to work in the same room, and allows the spouse to actually be on video while blurred, but draws the line at not being able to unblur the video.
It is it’s the NDA you made your partner sign.
There is and unfortunately I cannot show you the NDA as the NDA won’t allow me to show you the NDA. The NDA does allow me talk about the conditions in general like this though.
Huge, HUGE red flag. Even without it being I9 stuff.
I have worked remotely for 8+ years at this point. Sometimes I don’t even turn my camera on for meetings. It depends on a lot of factors. If my employer cared about any of that, they probably wouldn’t be a good employer for remote work.
15+ years working remote. I only turn my camera on when there are new vendors/clients on the call and it is my turn to introduce myself.
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That is the reason why identification documents are needed. How can they hire people without knowing who they are?
NK stole the identity of other Americans. They dotted i’s and crossed t’s to get into knowb4 via social engineering. Really fucked up.
Edit: check out the link above for full story
KnowBe4 has an article about their experience.
They also covered at least one other instance in the US.
Seems like something sufficient IT security could prevent easily enough.
It seems like you are getting more knee jerk than actual answers here. There is no evidence of any discrimination in asking to deblur the camera by itself. It also has nothing to do with an I9 validation. The I9 validation is checking for employment eligibility and citizenship status and that’s it. See below for the remote procedures. The employer’s obligation is to be consistent in the procedure and not discriminatory with the procedure based on race, gender, etc. I just think that HR drone is a dumbass.
Lastly, I think based on your other response to another poster she should take the job and just be keenly aware if anyone else in HR asks other funny stuff. There can always be dumbasses in every department and that’s not a reflection of their ability to be lawful or a bad company. I also think it’s worth reporting the person if they keep doing funny stuff.
From USCIS: Remote Examination of Documents Procedures: Examine copies (front and back, if the document is two-sided) of Form I-9 documents or an acceptable receipt to ensure that the documentation presented reasonably appears to be genuine and relates to the employee; Conduct a live video interaction with the individual presenting the document(s) to ensure that the documentation reasonably appears to be genuine and relates to the individual. The employee must first transmit a copy of the document(s) to the employer (per Step 1 above) and then present the same document(s) during the live video interaction; and Retain a clear and legible copy of the documentation (front and back if the documentation is two-sided).
Link https://www.uscis.gov/i-9-central/remote-examination-of-documents
the HR drone could’ve probably explained it better, but it’s possible for the background blur effect to distort a close up img on camera of a document, such as for I9. I recently went through a verification of my documents and had to do the same thing, except I made the call to unblur and immediately my docs were verifiable via camera.
Likely policy is to ask for blur effects to be disabled to remove the possibility of interference in be able to actually see/verify docs.
that HR drone is a dumbass
My take as well, and thanks for taking the time for a real answer.
You really shouldn’t hire a wife, that seems wrong
I mean I bet he got a really good deal for it otherwise he wouldn’t be bragging on the internet
I’m not sure what was going on, but a clear background can tell you a lot about a person. I’ve had a few interviewees that applied for US work with no sponsorship turn out to be not already in the US. Pretty sure they were trying to fake it long enough to get us to agree to sponsorship, or overlook the fact they weren’t in the US. The interviewees were both caught because of details in the background during the interview process. Weather and time of day outside the windows not matching where they claimed to live was one, the other was architecture that would be very atypical in a US home.
People are downvoting you, but you’re correct. I don’t work a particularly sensitive or interesting tech job, but we’ve had 2 candidates in the last year who were faking who/where they were. One had other people in the room feeding them answers. I’d expect weirdness in remote interviews as companies figure out how to navigate this.
I guess they’ll have to get a shipping container office
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Oooh that’s a good point. Never thought of that.
That would be fair, but the stated reason was to look at her background.
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Have they not got emails where you live?
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Oh. Where I live you just send a photo taken on your phone by email. It’s only so they can say they’ve asked for proof you’re allowed to work here after all.
AHRAB
All HR Are Bastards?
That’s a bingo
I initially read it as someone saying ‘Arab’ in a stereotypical Southern drawl, and I was confused.
I don’t know if they’re all bastards, but HR is absolutely not your friend. Human Resources <> protections for employees. Instead, Human Resources = protection for the company
Technically anything that is a “resource” for a company is something that is meant to be exploited for profit.
I don’t know if they’re all bastards
As it’s not likely that all people who work in HR have unmarried parents, it’s probably less literal language that labels them as belonging to a group of people who would harm you if it suited their interests.
All the HR people I’ve known who were not like that eventually left their job, because what they were asked to do went beyond their moral boundaries. Leaving HR to be the ones who were, indeed, those who didn’t feel such qualms.
I was a little bent when she told me he had asked her to remove her blur filter “to have a look at her working environment, make sure it’s not cluttered” (something along those lines).
Creepy.
Post pandemic, this kind of ID “verification” is SUPER bogus, but it’s quite common unfortunately, and, tbh, I can’t think of a better way to handle it that isn’t either in person or via snail mail.
Not great for sure, but most likely not racist, or at least not purposefully so (not that that matters).
Is this the US? Because iirc there’s some workplace injury stuff in some EU countries, where the company might be liable and so they might need to advise you to do certain things to prevent injury if you work remotely.
Not trying to take the wind out of your sails, just making ppl aware.
Same thing in Canada. When we transitioned to fully remote we had to ensure that our workspace is safe.
It’s actually a really nice thing to know that (a) your country makes sure you get into less accidents and (b) that your company usually pays for any workplace accidents, even if it’s remote.
I work remotely at a company in the EU where they actually host seminars about posture and stuff because it’s better for them than dealing with workplace injury from bad posture.
… except they ask you for a photo in the other direction, showing your chair and desk and keyboard. And not by surprise, just “send us a picture sometime for the audit.”
Idk, every company is different and so is every country.
But let me also make clear, I’m not arguing this isn’t odd. Just some things to rule out before going mayhem.
I’ve had similar language in employment agreements in the US and in Japan, framed around safety and insurance compliance. I never had to send an actual picture, but I’m pretty sure they said they reserved the right to ask for one.
US, yes. But the worker’s comp code for this position would be “clerical”. Nothing is rated safer by the comp insurance companies. Having worked for an employee leasing firm, I never heard of any sorts of safety requirements beyond normal office stuff. Fire extinguishers and first-aid kits, and that’s only for a shared office environment.
Why does she think it’s a racism thing?
No one else at this company requested such. Was he way out of line?
People who experience discrimination develop a sense for when someone is othering them. It’s not always correct, because it involves intuition, and you can misread people. But will still develop a sense for it.
Now, apply this to OP’s wife. OP says this about her:
If I hadn’t seen the blatant discrimination she’s faced job hunting, I’d be more skeptical. She’s Filipino, but that’s “Mexican” to many. When I say blatant, I mean to say heads would roll if we had some of this on camera. She’s mostly unhurt by these things, just figures that’s the way of the world. But damn. One lady asked if she was Asian and was visibly appalled. Another said she would have to attend their church, and barely stopped short of asking her to renounce Catholicism. There’s much more I’m not remembering ATM.
OP should consider screen-recording her zoom calls.
Anybody know a good screen recording program for Linux that doesn’t alert Zoom to the recording?
Run Zoom in a VM and record from the host maybe?
If you use the browser version of Zoom, it would have no way to know
The Zoom client alerts all parties. You could use another screen recorder, but this is a two-party recording state, straight illegal to record someone without their consent.
But why racism is particular? Sure I see how she has been “othered” by the interviewer, but why racism?
I have a birthmark that reads ‘VAGINA’ on my face.
Some people treat me differently from the moment I meet them.
I say, “I think that those people are reacting to my birthmark.”You ask: “Why assume they react to your VAGINA birthmark in particular?”
- The VAGINA birthmark is visible.
- People have made fun of me for having it before.
- I can see facial expressions when people perceive it, and notice features of judgemental reaction in their speech and behaviour after.
Now, apply this to OP’s wife. OP says this about her:
If I hadn’t seen the blatant discrimination she’s faced job hunting, I’d be more skeptical. She’s Filipino, but that’s “Mexican” to many. When I say blatant, I mean to say heads would roll if we had some of this on camera. She’s mostly unhurt by these things, just figures that’s the way of the world. But damn. One lady asked if she was Asian and was visibly appalled. Another said she would have to attend their church, and barely stopped short of asking her to renounce Catholicism. There’s much more I’m not remembering ATM.
I’m heavily autistic. I’ve figured this all out logically, as a person who has experience discrimination myself. It wasn’t easy, because I don’t grasp social cues natively. I thought I’d been doing something wrong for a long long time when people initially appraised me as ‘other’, but it turned out they were just being judgemental assholes. If you’re not heavily autistic, I believe it should be easier for you to figure all this out, right?
…you have a birthmark in the shape of legible english characters, not just one, but a full sequence which spell a word?..
It was a metaphor, lol
The irony of the autistic person using a metaphor, and someone else taking it too literally. You have to laugh!
It was a dumb metaphor that made no sense.
Well if you aren’t willing to engage in any sort of introspection all metaphor is stupid probably.
So, a visible difference that some other people react to with prejudice is not like racism. Got it.
You ask: “Why assume they react to your VISIBLE ETHNIC DIFFERENCES in particular?”
- The VISIBLE DIFFERENCES are visible.
- People have made fun of me for having those VISIBLE DIFFERENCES before.
- I can see facial expressions when people perceive THOSE VISIBLE DIFFERENCES, and notice features of judgemental reaction in their speech and behaviour after.
I’m sure you can comprehend why removing the controversial topic of ethnic differences [controversial because e.g. some people want to claim racism is does not happen any longer, or is not of any importance when it does because ‘it’s illegal to discriminate’] to replace it with another visible difference made it a suitable metaphor. I’m sure that you knew this, in fact, when you called it ‘dumb’.
Your annoyance is, therefore, possibly more at me saying that a woman is allowed to believe she is being targeted for racist reasons, and that such a woman should be listened to fairly. Feel free to clarify on that, if you wish. As for me, I logically believe that racism exists, as I have seen it. And that people can intuit when it is happening, as I have seen it. And that other people can disagree with it, because they profit from racism being ignored, as I have seen it.Or maybe the problem is with you?
I think it made sense to most other people who read it
I’m autistic also and I understood it just fine.
It’s about as likely as someone starting and ending all of their writing with ellipses, with some of those ellipses being incomplete.
I’ve put a shoji screen behind my workspace for these kind of situations. One client was really paranoid like that.
