A
male
age
36-40,
*azed4ever
writes:Hello, I really don’t know who or where to turn to for advice- but I am extremely upset to the point where I feel like I cannot move on. First, I will let you know that I have been questioning my sexuality for a few years- and currently I feel that I may be gay or bisexual. This however, is a one my biggest secrets that no one has a clue about. Anyhow, I work for my father at his company, and I am the managing director. A few days ago, I gave access to my computer to one of my employees to print out some documents. I mistakenly left my hard drive open on the computer. The hard drive contained a lot of sensitive information and it also contained gay pornographic videos and pictures. My office does have a camera installed right where the computer screen is- but the camera doesn’t work, (but my employees don’t know this – I think). Anyhow, I checked the ‘recently opened documents’ folder on my computer, and that confirmed that no files had been opened from the hard drive. However, there is a possibility that he could’ve opened the hard drive folders and quickly ‘previewed’ the pornographic pictures- and windows would not have any record of this. I confronted him indirectly about my hard drive being left open, and he said that he knew it was mine, so he didn’t open it. So this has been driving me crazy to the point where I feel like throwing up. I cannot focus at work, I have been extremely depressed, and just the thought of my employee knowing about my ‘dark’ secret is making me crazy. Btw, I am working in a country where homosexuality –or even pornography – is not tolerated– so there is no chance of me being ‘proud and loud’ about this. I thought that I would feel better after a few days, but the thought of him going through my hard drive porn is driving me crazy to the point where I am restless and can’t sleep at night. I feel like my reputation is compromised. I doubt that this one employee is the type of person to talk to other employees about this- but i don't really know. Is there anything I can do to improve this situation? Is it all in my head?
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reader, anonymous, writes (24 October 2012): Do you think this employee would snoop? If he/she didn't act weird when you asked, and claimed they didn't look at anything, even though there was a "camera", you probably don't have anything to worry about. I just wouldn't make the same mistake again. Also, I hide all of my porn in folder after folder after folder. Ha, it's sometimes in the most random places, even I forget.
A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (21 October 2012): Hi, i am the original poster.
I would like to clarify that I have never looked up porn at work- never will. The portable hard drive- (kinda like a really large USB flash drive) contained some office files that I neeeded to bring to work from home. After extracting the files, i forgot about the hard drive and and left it attached to my office computer.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (21 October 2012): I'm sorry that you are going through this mental anguish but you did break the rules. No porn at work and you violated it. If you hadn't been watching it at work of all places your secret will still be safe.
The best thing you can do at this point is come clean. Would you rather have it come from you or from somebody else. Talk to your father in private. I know this going to be a shock to him but this will take away the anxiety. So the choice is yours. Anxiety or get it off your choice. Best of luck.
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A
female
reader, Nime +, writes (21 October 2012):
 First of all, is this your computer for your work-place, at times hooked up to your work-place's network? If so, you shouldn't have pornography or anything like that on your computer. I don't know how it is since it's your father's company (maybe he just lets you do whatever you want) and you're not in the US, but here in the US downloading or keeping pornography at work would almost certainly be a violation of company policy, misuse of company technology, and probable grounds for termination of employment.I work as a software engineer in a classified area so technology use and misuse is an issue we must constantly be mindful of. We are definitely monitored; are you? Some companies have very strict policies about this; I'm assuming yours does since you say pornography isn't tolerated. Well, if your computer is hooked up to the company network you should be worried. If you've downloaded porn at work or stored it on a mapped drive, your network or sys admins can see at any time. Even if you think you've stored your porn locally and private to your machine (which I doubt), your files are obviously not safe from an SA if your computer's on the network or if they've got you under desktop surveillance. If I were you I would delete that crap off your computer, stop all internet activity related to pornography at work, and hope that nobody has seen anything or looks at the traffic logs. At the very least stop downloading porn at work (if you are) because the high traffic is easy to spot and usually means one thing.
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