We shouldn’t need these gadgets in the first place, though.

I was surprised to learn employer surveillance is more common than I thought. A recent examination by the New York Times found that 80% of the 10 largest private U.S. employers track the productivity metrics of individual workers.

And secretly monitoring employees makes them more likely to the very break rules these systems are trying to deter, according to a recent study by Harvard Business Review.

Transparency is key to keeping worker morale up. Instead of monitoring employees, explaining the scope and purpose of monitoring can boost employees’ acceptance of the practice by about 70%, according to a recent study by Gartner, a management consultant company.