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https://sg.news.yahoo.com/life-without-i...42224.html
For Jack, 28, an employee at the Singapore Tourism Board, creating decks and presentation slides are supposed to be one of the easiest tasks at the office.
But thanks to the new cybersecurity policy which cut internet access on civil servants’ computers last May, what used to be a simple straightforward drag-and-drop on his computer has become a cumbersome process.
Now that his terminal has been isolated from the outside world, like a computer in a North Korean laboratory, Jack literally has to walk to another workstation with internet connectivity whenever he needs to download attachments from companies and external partners.
It’s like the ’90s all over again, and this happens at least a few times every day.
“It was really frustrating in the beginning because you had to keep moving about just to download a few files that are necessary for your work, and it really hurt our productivity,” Jack tells me.
“Also, we have only two internet terminals shared among 20 people in the department – that already sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it?”
Belinda, 29, who is currently serving her notice at a ministry, describes her workplace as a set on the TV comedy series The Office, where the lack of internet access “intertwines with the bureaucratic nightmare” to create a “dysfunctional hell” for employees at times.
“Sure, I may be exaggerating this, but I just found it ludicrous that I have to clear so many hurdles at work just because they are scared that my computer may be hacked or infected. I can’t perform at my best like this,” she says.
But offering internet-enabled devices doesn’t completely appease these disgruntled civil servants because they don’t actually help improve their workflow. Ultimately, they still have to transfer data from one device to another, and that is unnecessarily time-consuming.
Taking away the convenience of keyboard shortcuts like “Alt-Tab” and “Ctrl-C + Ctrl-V”, which are second nature in nearly all office tasks, is like denying an employee his basic rights.
Dennis, whose department deals with matters of national security, laments that even simple yet crucial things like a Microsoft Excel formula that he found online has to be sent to his email first before he can even input them on his own workstation.
“The one thing that I hate most is when I have to find someone’s email address online and it’s so long and convoluted, yet I still can’t simply copy and paste the email address but have to either email it to myself or manually type it in.”
Often, he resorts to using mobile data to surf the web on his phone for work, sometimes incurring additional charges as a result. But he has little choice – it’s just quicker than waiting to use the internet-enabled laptops shared among his colleagues.
He adds, “I know it sounds very lame to complain about matters like these that may seem so trivial, but for millennials like myself this is torture.”
Sharon, who left the civil service this year to join the private sector, jokes that she was so used to surfing the web on her phone at her former workplace, she forgets that she now works at a normal office with internet access on her computer.
Over time, the additional few seconds or minutes spent on just transferring information between computers can accumulate to significant wastage.
“Imagine how much more time you can spend with your family instead?” says Jonathan, who frequently uses the internet at work to research international partners and statistics.
Due to the highly sensitive nature of his work, Jonathan’s department is one of the few who had already been practicing workplace internet segregation for years before the policy was implemented last year.
For Jack, 28, an employee at the Singapore Tourism Board, creating decks and presentation slides are supposed to be one of the easiest tasks at the office.
But thanks to the new cybersecurity policy which cut internet access on civil servants’ computers last May, what used to be a simple straightforward drag-and-drop on his computer has become a cumbersome process.
Now that his terminal has been isolated from the outside world, like a computer in a North Korean laboratory, Jack literally has to walk to another workstation with internet connectivity whenever he needs to download attachments from companies and external partners.
It’s like the ’90s all over again, and this happens at least a few times every day.
“It was really frustrating in the beginning because you had to keep moving about just to download a few files that are necessary for your work, and it really hurt our productivity,” Jack tells me.
“Also, we have only two internet terminals shared among 20 people in the department – that already sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it?”
Belinda, 29, who is currently serving her notice at a ministry, describes her workplace as a set on the TV comedy series The Office, where the lack of internet access “intertwines with the bureaucratic nightmare” to create a “dysfunctional hell” for employees at times.
“Sure, I may be exaggerating this, but I just found it ludicrous that I have to clear so many hurdles at work just because they are scared that my computer may be hacked or infected. I can’t perform at my best like this,” she says.
But offering internet-enabled devices doesn’t completely appease these disgruntled civil servants because they don’t actually help improve their workflow. Ultimately, they still have to transfer data from one device to another, and that is unnecessarily time-consuming.
Taking away the convenience of keyboard shortcuts like “Alt-Tab” and “Ctrl-C + Ctrl-V”, which are second nature in nearly all office tasks, is like denying an employee his basic rights.
Dennis, whose department deals with matters of national security, laments that even simple yet crucial things like a Microsoft Excel formula that he found online has to be sent to his email first before he can even input them on his own workstation.
“The one thing that I hate most is when I have to find someone’s email address online and it’s so long and convoluted, yet I still can’t simply copy and paste the email address but have to either email it to myself or manually type it in.”
Often, he resorts to using mobile data to surf the web on his phone for work, sometimes incurring additional charges as a result. But he has little choice – it’s just quicker than waiting to use the internet-enabled laptops shared among his colleagues.
He adds, “I know it sounds very lame to complain about matters like these that may seem so trivial, but for millennials like myself this is torture.”
Sharon, who left the civil service this year to join the private sector, jokes that she was so used to surfing the web on her phone at her former workplace, she forgets that she now works at a normal office with internet access on her computer.
Over time, the additional few seconds or minutes spent on just transferring information between computers can accumulate to significant wastage.
“Imagine how much more time you can spend with your family instead?” says Jonathan, who frequently uses the internet at work to research international partners and statistics.
Due to the highly sensitive nature of his work, Jonathan’s department is one of the few who had already been practicing workplace internet segregation for years before the policy was implemented last year.
