Website filtering, as part of a greater online security plan, is one step businesses can take to boost staff productivity, according to security software firm Veritech Corporation.
Without web security, every connected business is at risk of their staff viewing unwanted content, or at worst becoming victim to fraud and viruses, said Veritech CEO Livio Mazzon. At the very least, website filtering allows a business to securely monitor its network’s internet access to ensure compliance and improve productivity.
“Web surfing during work time seems to be a small issue and content filtering not that necessary, maybe even draconian. But by not having content filtering, a business is wasting thousands of hours in staff time each year, and consequently thousands of dollars a year in unproductive wages,” said Mazzon.
According to Veritech’s calculations, just 15 minutes a day of non-work-related web surfing for even a small business with few employees can add up to thousands of dollars of lost productivity a year.
“As a small business owner myself I understand that as managers we want to trust our staff and believe that web surfing is not a major issue,” said Mazzon.
“But, when you read statistics that tell you 30-40 percent of internet use in the workplace is not related to business and 37 percent of workers surf the web constantly while they are at work it’s time to make some smart business decisions,” he added, citing information provided by IDC Research and Vault.com.
Mazzon said content filtering software was one way to control the websites staff could access. More sophisticated software could be configured to filter sites by username, position, computer, the time of day, site addresses, site content, for example.
Protection should also extend to viruses and unwanted content such as violence, pornography or illegal software, he added.
Do you monitor your employees’ internet usage? Why/why not?