Your "Private" Slack DM Is Not Private.
I worked as a SysAdmin for 10 years. I have had uncomfortable conversations with CEOs who asked me to "pull the logs" on an employee they wanted to fire.
Employees are naive. You think because you are on your home Wi-Fi, you are safe. You think because you bought a $5 physical "Mouse Jiggler" from Amazon, you are beating the system.
You aren't.
In 2025, "Productivity Monitoring" (Bossware) is standard issue at 70% of Fortune 500s.
They don't tell you they installed it. It runs silently in the background as system-kernel.exe.
Here is exactly what they can see, and why your "Incognito Mode" is a joke.
1. The "SSL Inspection" Man-in-the-Middle
You see the "Green Lock" (HTTPS) in your browser. You think your traffic is encrypted. It is encrypted... to the outside world. But your company laptop has a "Root Certificate" installed by IT.
This allows the corporate firewall (Zscaler, Palo Alto) to perform SSL Inspection.
- Step 1: You go to
Gmail.com. - Step 2: The firewall intercepts the request, decrypts it, reads it, re-encrypts it, and sends it to Google.
- The Result: They can read the content of your HTTPS traffic. They can see the search terms you type into YouTube. They can see the job application you just submitted to their competitor.
2. The "Screenshot" Lottery
Tools like Time Doctor and Hubstaff take random screenshots of your desktop.
Usually every 10 minutes.
But they are smart. They don't take it at :00, :10, :20.
They take it at :03, :14, :29.
I knew a developer who was watching Netflix on his second monitor. He thought he was safe because he paused it when he heard a Slack notification. He wasn't safe. The software captured a frame of The Office while he was debugging code. He was fired for "Time Theft." The Rule: If it is a company laptop, never put anything personal on the pixels. Even for a second.
3. The "Mouse Jiggler" Trap
You bought a physical mouse jiggler to keep your Teams status "Green." Smart. Software jigglers are detectable. Physical ones are harder.
But here is how we catch you: Heuristics.
- Human Behavior: Moves the mouse in arcs. Clicks things. Types.
- Jiggler Behavior: Moves the mouse 1 pixel left, 1 pixel right. Repeatedly. For 4 hours.
Modern Endpoint Detection (EDR) tools flag this as "Anomalous Input." I get an alert: "User Leon has had continuous mouse input for 240 minutes with 0 keyboard strokes." You aren't working. You are sleeping. And now I have the logs to prove it.
The Real Numbers: What IT Actually Logs
I broke down the logging capabilities of standard corporate tools vs. what employees think is logged.
| Activity | Can IT See It? | How They See It |
|---|---|---|
| Slack DMs | Yes | eDiscovery Admin Export (They don't read live, but can pull history instantly). |
| Incognito History | Yes | DNS Logs & Proxy Logs (Incognito only hides it from your history, not the network). |
| Personal WhatsApp | No | If you use your phone. If you use WhatsApp Web on their laptop? Yes. |
| Mouse Jiggler | Yes | Input Heuristics (Zero keyboard activity + Constant mouse motion). |
The Verdict: Assume your work laptop is projecting to a billboard in the CEO's office.
Frequently Asked Questions (That HR Hides)
Is this legal?
In the US? Yes. The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) gives employers the right to monitor communications on their equipment. You signed a handbook on Day 1 consenting to this. In the EU (GDPR), it is harder, but in the US, you have zero privacy rights on company hardware.
How do I check if I have spyware?
Open your Task Manager (Windows) or Activity Monitor (Mac).
Look for processes like Tanium, CrowdStrike, Carbon Black, or generic names like AgentService.
Check your Chrome Extensions. Is there a "Force Installed" extension with a generic icon? That is often a screen recorder.
What is the only safe way to slack off?
Separate Hardware. Do not watch Netflix on the work laptop. Do not job hunt on the work laptop. Buy a separate $300 Chromebook. Put it on a separate Wi-Fi network (Guest Network). Keep the work laptop strictly for work. If you want to take a nap, physically close the work laptop so the "Offline" status is honest. It is better to be "Away" than to be caught "Faking Active." See our 'Unlimited PTO' guide for how to take breaks legally.
Leon Staffing places candidates at companies that trust their employees. If you are tired of being watched like a criminal, find a trust-first role here.