In a global modernized workplace, new tools are likely to be developed, facilitating and augmenting employees' work experience. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, fully remote or hybrid work removed any physical barriers and often contributed to improved work-life balance. However, tools for supporting remote workers (or those who prefer a hybrid work mode) may inadvertently become surveillance tools, compromising employees' privacy.

To unpack the AI ethics of workplace technologies, we conducted a crowdsourcing study to understand how employees judge such technologies and determine which ones are desirable, and why. We considered 16 workplace technologies that track productivity based on diverse inputs (e.g., tracking audio conversation during virtual meetings, tracking text messages in collaboration tools), and asked crowd-workers to judge these scenarios along five moral dimensions. We found that workplace technologies were judged harshly depending on three aspects (heuristics) participants used to assess the scenarios. In increasing importance, these aspects reflected whether a scenario: 1) was not currently supported by existing technologies (hard to adopt); 2) interfered with current ways of working (intrusive); and, more importantly, 3) was not fit for tracking productivity or infringed on individual rights (harmful). Tracking eye movements in virtual meetings and the visited websites in remote work, despite being possible, were considered to be "on the way" of getting the job done (they were easy to adopt but intrusive). By contrast, tracking text messages in collaboration tools such as Slack was considered to not interfere with work (unobtrusive). Finally, tracking audio conversations in virtual meetings was considered to be possible (easy to adopt), and not interfere with work (unobtrusive), yet it was considered to be harmful, as it entailed tracking not only whether a meeting took place but also its content, causing a loss of control.

The above heuristics offer a guide on how workplace technologies are likely to be morally judged. Having a technology that is easy to implement and does not interfere with work is not necessarily a technology that should be deployed. Tracking facial expressions (even beyond the nefarious uses—of dubious effectiveness—of inferring political orientation or sexual preferences) is possible and could be done in seamless ways (e.g., with existing off-the-shelf cameras), yet it would be still considered harmful and unethical. Tracking eye movements, task completion, or typing behavior was considered a proxy for focus (harmless) yet intrusive as it would "get in the way". Tracking social media use in remote work was considered not only intrusive but also harmful, as it infringes on privacy rights.