I definitely agree with Brian on this for #3. I would also be concerned about the liability of having possession of employee personal files. Do you protect laptop backups to PII standards? What are you going to do if a departed employee asks (demands) that all their personal data be deleted. Depending on your backup architecture that could be painful. Just like torrent downloads, what if they are storing explicit pictures?
And if your environment is this lax, I would doubt the viability of your comment about malware protection. On Wed, Dec 7, 2016 at 11:41 PM, Brian Desmond <[email protected]> wrote: > *For #3, that seems like a discussion around acceptable use and risk for > your attorneys rather than IT. The others I would generally agree with your > manager. * > > > > *Thanks,* > > *Brian Desmond* > > > > *w – 312.625.1438 <(312)%20625-1438> | c – 312.731.3132 <(312)%20731-3132>* > > > > *From:* [email protected] [mailto:listsadmin@lists. > myitforum.com] *On Behalf Of *Kish N Kepi > *Sent:* Wednesday, December 7, 2016 10:24 PM > *To:* Kish N Kepi <[email protected]> > *Subject:* [NTSysADM] OT: IT Philosophy > > > > We keep a lax environment – our users are local admins on their Windows > laptops and we not stop them from installing any software they want – the > only caveat I ever say is ‘don’t be stupid’. And yes, we are a hi-tech > house, well beyond the startup stage. > > > > During a conversation about potential changes to the way we do backups > today, I stated that the current back up routine specifically excludes most > media files, and also that I’d used psexec to kill utorrent processes. My > boss, who is actually quite knowledgeable in IT matters, had a response > surprised me: why? Why not backup the media files? Why not allow torrent > traffic? His points were as follows: > > 1. We give them laptops and smartphones and expect them to be > available at all hours of the day – that’s convergence of home and office > life – why shouldn’t we backup the photos of their kids, pets and vacations > too? > > 2. Do we have bandwidth issues? We have a broad link to the > internet and only at periodic peaks do we hit anywhere near our limit > > 3. Legality of torrents? Really? How many people care about the > legality? > > 4. Malware? We have other protections in place. > > > > I couldn’t come up with any answers that sounded reasonable to me, so at > this stage, we’re planning increase our backup storage capacity. > > > > Does anyone here have answers that I lack? Sorry for cross-posting, but I > this question is bothering me, and I know that many people in this for a > have strong, well-formed (and well-expressed) opinions > > > > Kish n Kepi >
