The FitBit that Melissa wears monitors her daily life activities such as her health and well-being goals, what she eats, how many steps she’s taken, and her heart rate. In the real world, FitBits can be a great tool for invidiuals to reach and maintain health goals; they increase one's awareness of their activity and can make one more accountable. Each individual is able to see their own data. However, Melissa’s employer is able to see her personal information without her knowledge.

Feehan, L. M., Geldman, J., Sayre, E. C., Park, C., Ezzat, A. M., Yoo, J. Y., Hamilton, C. B., & Li, L. C. (2018). Accuracy of Fitbit Devices: Systematic Review and Narrative Syntheses of Quantitative Data. JMIR mHealth and uHealth, 6(8), e10527. https://doi.org/10.2196/10527

Melissa is sent to the Health and Wellness Center through work in order to help with her lack of focus and decreased productivity at work. Here, she is given a FitBit to address issues with productivity and daily life activities. In the real world, FitBits are connected to wellness programs, which are linked to employers. There is a desire for maximizing human productivity throughout the 20th century, and the installation of well-being programs seek to combat worker fatigue, obesity rates, and even smoking habits. However, these programs can promote power imbalances, as they are often not as voluntary as they appear. Regulations such as Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act have not evolved to guard against potential employee discrimination based on information collected from such programs either.

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Stressful situations, such as workplace surveillance, trigger the release of adrenalin, glucocorticoids, and other stress hormones. These triggers can have devastating effects to health such as suppression of immune system and secretion of growth hormones. Constant demand to perform well creates work related stress leading to psychological, physical, and mental stress. Psychological stress leads to depression and anxiety. Physiological changes such as reduction of cognition may occur too.

Ma, J., Sachdev, A. R., & Tang, N. (2021). Emotional, cognitive, and physiological responses to workplace ostracism. Workplace Ostracism, 101–132. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54379-2_4

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Melissa is surveilled through key logging, screenshotting, and video camera recording. Key logging records the keystrokes on employee’s computer, screenshotting monitoring system automatically captures the computer screen, and video camera recording surveilles the employees at all times while working. During the COVID-19 pandemic, companies who offer remote surveillance technology (ex. Time Doctor, ActivTrak, Teramind, Hubstaff) have seen large increases in sales. Some employees have even quit their jobs under such surveillance, stating, "It's not worth it for me right now to sacrifice my personal privacy and all my data for a paycheck" (Allyn, 2020). However, employees who may be experiencing more financial insecurity may not be able to protect themselves in the same way.

Allyn, B. (2020, May 13). Your Boss Is Watching You: Work-From-Home Boom Leads To More Surveillance. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2020/05/13/854014403/your-boss-is-watching-you-work-from-home-boom-leads-to-more-surveillance.

Morrison, S. (2020, April 2). Just because you're working from home doesn't mean your boss isn't watching you. Vox. https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/4/2/21195584/coronavirus-remote-work-from-home-employee-monitoring.

Sommers, L. (2020). Is it Legal to Track Employees Using GPS? THE TIMESHEETS.COM JOURNAL. https://www.timesheets.com/blog/2019/08/is-it-legal-to-track-employees-using-gps/

Even though privacy laws should be used with transparency, legally, and fairly, there is a constant misuse of power from employers who invade employee’s privacy while working. While remote surveillance companies often encourage employers to be transparent about their usage of tracking technology, there are no federal regulations requiring employers to notify their workers of how they are being tracked.

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Workplace Privacy and Employee Monitoring | Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. (2019). Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. https://privacyrights.org/consumer-guides/workplace-privacy-and-employee-monitoring