LONDON, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Barclays is changing a
system it was piloting that tracks how employees spend their
time at work, after critical media reports on Thursday accused
the bank of spying on its staff.
A Barclays spokeswoman said it was changing how it used the
Sapience software so it would now track only anonymised data, in
response to staff feedback that the system was intrusive.
Sapience gives companies "insights into work patterns" and
tracks employee productivity by monitoring their computer usage,
according to its website.
CityAM newspaper first reported Barclays' use of the
software on Thursday, citing privacy campaigners who criticised
the scheme as "creepy".
Barclays said the system was only being trialled with a
small number of employees, and that it was not designed to
monitor how and when staff took breaks, as newspaper reports
said.
Such systems are becoming increasingly common among banks
and other financial firms, which use voice recognition and other
behaviour-tracking tools to watch for unusual behaviour that
could indicate misconduct.
In 2017 Barclays faced widespread criticism when it rolled
out a system known as OccupEye which tracked how long people
spent at their desks.
(Reporting by Lawrence White; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
Barclays (BARC)
