Compromising pics found on office computer -UPDATE-

[Turin39789]

Do a Google image search for "jailbait" and I bet you will find the pic you have on the laptop.

It is an internet meme. It's a joke.

Now why were you doing it on your employer's property?

And why did you save it to a file.

You can get fired for using Ebay, they didn't give you that laptop to 4chan on, if this is what it appears to be this guy is too stupid to be employed in an environment where electricity is available.

 

[edro]

Now why were you doing it on your employer's property?

And why did you save it to a file.

You can get fired for using Ebay, they didn't give you that laptop to 4chan on, if this is what it appears to be this guy is too stupid to be employed in an environment where electricity is available.

You would turn in a coworker for browsing eBay at work?
You must have a lot of friends...

 

[3chordcharlie]

I just think that if I do take the step to report it nothing may come of it except this guy finding out I ratted him out. The chain of command here isn't known for honesty from the top guy on down.

But then, it remains, do I just ignore the pictures? Maybe I should...

Anything that's borderline you don't need to present as an accusation; depending on your talent with subtlety, you can 'report it' as nothing more than 'Here give this to 'Johnny' so he can copy his photos so he doesn't lose them', leave one open, and let the middleman deal with it.

 

[mvbighead]

Honestly, you HAVE to report this. Despite what some are saying against it, it is the right thing to do. It is inappropriate, and should not be done with company property. Any right-minded person would not have done this.

Also, with a community-based account, it is very difficult to prove who did or did not put the pictures on the computer. By bringing it to the attention of your HR department, your are sending a clear message that it is something that you are uncomfortable with. That alone should send an all-clear to them, IMO, and they will be more than likely to focus on the most likely suspect. From an IT perspective, such global accounts are not good for a variety of reasons, and perhaps nothing will come of it, but you should not leave this decision up to yourself. It seriously should be brought to the attention of a superior.

Best of luck in coming to your own decision, but I would strongly advise you bring this to a superior's attention, and let them deal with it. Good luck.

 

[paulney]

Actually, I stand corrected!

Woe is me, I saw some non-nekkid girlz on a company laptop
...

you know the rest (3 pages now and going strong)

 

[Whoozyerdaddy]

Could they? Is there a way to tell when they were saved so it proves that I physically didn't have the computer at that time?

Regardless of what they can or can't prove... the safe move is to hand the laptop over and say "Hey... I checked out this computer and while I was using it I found this folder with these pics."

That covers your butt 100%.

You're not blaming anyone. You're not pointing fingers. You're not ratting anyone out.

 

[DrPizza]

Wow, Mosh, that kinda sucks to be in your position. However, lacking y-chromosomes, you do have a slight advantage - you can always play the sexual harassment card if you even slightly perceived any negative reaction toward you, regardless of what course of action you take.

Thus, copy them to a CD (never, ever do this with illegal pornographic material - regardless of the intent, that makes you just as guilty) as a backup as proof that you felt uncomfortable working in an environment where male coworkers were staring at such pictures on the company computer.

Then, delete the images & say nothing. As the photos are "legal" - there are no legal consequences toward the person who downloaded them in the first place. Since that person is friends with the head honchos in your workplace, then I doubt anything would be done to him, other than a slap on the wrist just for the sake of appearing to be enforcing whatever workplace rules you have.

But, as I'm suggesting, in all likelihood, nothing will ever be said if those photos are just deleted. But, in the unlikely case that something IS said, and it even slightly looks like it's painting you in a bad light, then play the sexual harassment card.

edit: this should have been prefaced with the idea that I'm under the impression the type of work environment you're in, there are probably no more than a total of 25 employees? If we're talking about a significantly larger company, then by all means, turn it in to a female in HR (if there is one.)

 

[Number1]

OMG are you retarded?

You need to turn this in to HR. This type of picture do NOT belong on a work computer and you do not want to be associated with them in any way.
For crying out loud turn the fucking thing in and make a big fuzz about it. Let everybody know you found this stuff on the computer.

HR can then decide how to handle this.

 

[LikeLinus]

LOLWUT

Have you been a tattle tail your whole life?
Did you get beat up a lot as a kid?

You're a child, we will leave it at that.

I've worked for 3 different Fortune 50 companies in my career and all three would fire an employee for not providing known information about someone violating company policies - especially anything related to potential kiddy porn. A lot of companies have integrity guidelines and moral clauses written into their HR polices and procedures. It all depends on your company.

I damn sure know I would tell my immediate manager so this could not come back on me. She has logged into the laptop after the accused and this could raise a red flag if someone else found out down the road and an internal investigation lead to checking the log files to see files accessed and deleted.

You are playing with fire by even thinking about deleting a file and covering up for someone. Why anyone would even question covering up someone viewing potential kiddy porn or inappropriate work photos is beyond me.

It is company property and this person is using company property for non-work related activies that could potentially be illegal. I'm not saying the photos he has are, but he may have been viewing other things. You do not know if he has deleted other files and what web sites he may have viewed and covered his tracks.

 

[edro]

After you report it to your supervisor and he laughs and deletes it, you will feel really awkward.

 

[Turin39789]

You would turn in a coworker for browsing eBay at work?
You must have a lot of friends...

IT/IS has turned me in for browsing EBAY at work, though I wasn't fired.

Every corporate work environment I have been in has had a very strict and detailed policy about use of company resource. They can become selective about enforcement at will.

 

[Jeff7]

You can easily find out when a file was 'created' or 'made' on a computer. Also, since this is a community account, they should have logs of when people sign on/off. It wouldn't take a genius to put the two together and get a pretty good idea of who put them on the account.

It's also possible to rewrite the Created/Accessed/Modified timestamps on files.

Erasure option:
Just using Windows to erase a file might leave some kind of traces as to when it was deleted.
But I think if you use something like Eraser, the only "traces" of the files left would be sections of the drive overwritten with zeroes. And then do a zero-write of the free space, just to be sure.
If you go that route though, you know nothing about the files, and you didn't erase anything unusual.

....wow, the new Eraser v6 even has a feature, "Replace erased files with the following files to allow plausible deniability."
Crazy.


Is it the best option? I don't know.
1) If you were able to find the images in the first place, someone else would be able to find them as well.
2) It's likely he downloaded them; he'd just be able to re-download them again later.

Company property isn't for porn, unless you work for Penthouse.


Edit: Ok, I missed the "fully clothed" part.
If that's the case, then I guess that takes it down a notch, more in line with "Misusing company property."

 

[Turin39789]

Hell, even if I pretend these were pictures of fully clothed 30 year old women kissing and groping each other on the laptop another employeed passed off to me, I ain't getting stuck with the hot potato.

 

[3chordcharlie]

After you report it to your supervisor and he laughs and deletes it, you will feel really awkward.

which is why you don't do this:

OMG are you retarded?

For crying out loud turn the fucking thing in and make a big fuzz about it. Let everybody know you found this stuff on the computer.

 

[moshquerade]

Wow, Mosh, that kinda sucks to be in your position. However, lacking y-chromosomes, you do have a slight advantage - you can always play the sexual harassment card if you even slightly perceived any negative reaction toward you, regardless of what course of action you take.

Thus, copy them to a CD (never, ever do this with illegal pornographic material - regardless of the intent, that makes you just as guilty) as a backup as proof that you felt uncomfortable working in an environment where male coworkers were staring at such pictures on the company computer.

Then, delete the images & say nothing. As the photos are "legal" - there are no legal consequences toward the person who downloaded them in the first place. Since that person is friends with the head honchos in your workplace, then I doubt anything would be done to him, other than a slap on the wrist just for the sake of appearing to be enforcing whatever workplace rules you have.

But, as I'm suggesting, in all likelihood, nothing will ever be said if those photos are just deleted. But, in the unlikely case that something IS said, and it even slightly looks like it's painting you in a bad light, then play the sexual harassment card.

Are you being serious? I don't play "the sexual harassment card". Sheesh Dr. P. What is up with you tonight?

 

[LikeLinus]

After you report it to your supervisor and he laughs and deletes it, you will feel really awkward.

That may be true, but in this day and age it is better to CYA than anything else. Is your career worth this idiot who's viewing young women making out on a company laptop? Hell no.

You must have missed this recently.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10416476-71.html

You think 4 people being fired for Fantasy Football is less of an act than viewing young women making out on a company laptop?

 

[moshquerade]

OMG are you retarded?

You need to turn this in to HR. This type of picture do NOT belong on a work computer and you do not want to be associated with them in any way.
For crying out loud turn the fucking thing in and make a big fuzz about it. Let everybody know you found this stuff on the computer.

HR can then decide how to handle this.

I must be retarded to ask for advice here and deal with people like you.

Now, step back, and realize that calling me a retard was uncalled for. I am a competent intelligent adult who has a dilemma and came here asking for advice. Most of the people here are sincere and helpful, and then there's you who feels the need to add an insult to injury.

 

[Zebo]

Fbi. HR director won't be friends after he has to go to field office to pick up computer.

 

[moshquerade]

I've decided I am going to mention what I found to the IT guy, who hopefully tomorrow will assist me on some troubleshooting. Not going to say who I suspect the perp is, just going to show him what I've found.

 

[lxskllr]

Do you run to the manager when someone comes back from lunch 5 minutes late?
Do you report coworkers who take company pens home?
Do you report coworkers for touching up their resumes on company time?

If not, then you shouldn't report this. This stupid petty assed shit is the reason America sucks. Everybody's concerned with covering their ass instead of doing the right thing. It goes from the lowest level office worker all the way up the presidency. People need to start worrying about the shit that really matters, instead of kissing/covering ass.

 

[LikeLinus]

Mosh, I'm not suggesting you run to your HR and be like "OMG LOOK WHAT I FOUND, FIRE THIS GUY!!!".

I think if you talked with your immediate manager and just approached it as you found something that someone (other than yourself) could potentially find offensive and you were not sure if you should delete them or if someone needed to talk with him. I mean just do it in a non-hostle manner. Just ask the advise of your manager and see what they say. That way if anything pops up later (if the manager says to just delete and nothing more) then you have some recourse and you can say you spoke with someone.

 

[meltdown75]

tough spot to be in...... it's too bad you're not friends with the guy, you could just tell him he was a dumbass for using the company computers for pr0n and hopefully delete them.

i'd probably do nothing and just give the laptop back without mentioning anything and play dumb about it..... then again the pics are of pretty young girls. eek... like i said tough spot to be in...

FWIW i worked on someone's computer before and found images that were of very young children... i even struggled with deciding to go to the authorities but in the end i did. good luck with whatever you decide......

 

[moshquerade]

Do you run to the manager when someone comes back from lunch 5 minutes late?
Do you report coworkers who take company pens home?
Do you report coworkers for touching up their resumes on company time?

If not, then you shouldn't report this. This stupid petty assed shit is the reason America sucks. Everybody's concerned with covering their ass instead of doing the right thing. It goes from the lowest level office worker all the way up the presidency. People need to start worrying about the shit that really matters, instead of kissing/covering ass.

You are comparing apples to oranges.

Like maybe I should report people for sneezing and not using a kleenex.
Don't paint me the company narc on this one. It's more serious than pocketing a frickin pen.

 

[lxskllr]

You are comparing apples to oranges.

Like maybe I should report people for sneezing and not using a kleenex.
Don't paint me the company narc on this one. It's more serious than pocketing a frickin pen.

It's the exact same thing.

Stealing company time.
Stealing company materials
Stealing company time again, or possibly moonlighting with a competing firm.....

 

[LikeLinus]

It's the exact same thing.

Stealing company time.
Stealing company materials
Stealing company time again, or possibly moonlighting with a competing firm.....

LOL, stealing company time. That's rich.