Are Your Employee Technology Policies from the Dark Ages?

With technology advancing at the current rate, the dark ages referenced isn’t ten or fifteen years ago, but instead, two or three. If your capacity for reviewing policies and practices at the beginning of the year is limited, working with your information technology department and crafting up-to-date and relevant policies and practices related to technology in the workplace should be at the top of your list.

Activity tracking devices, smart glasses, and other employee efficiency tracking devices no longer serve as the baseline for technology in the workplace. Last year, Sony filed a patent for a “smart” contact lens which will record images to an internal storage device so that users can “easily and quickly access” recordings. How could this new technology effect your current confidentiality provisions? Or, if you still have guidelines prohibiting recordings in the workplace, what effect will these contacts have on your current policies?

A company in Australia, Rio Tinto, has employees wearing a device called a “SmartCap” that looks like a baseball cap but includes sensors that detect alertness and which will provide a warning when a driver is approaching a microsleep. Does such technology have GINA or ADA implications?

Do your policies and practices comply with state and federal law while simultaneously incorporating new and emerging technology? If not, contact a member of Verrill Dana’s Labor and Employment Practice Group to discuss more.