#remote work tracking software

[wanywheresolution]

Boost productivity, enhance accuracy, and streamline workforce management to focus on what truly matters—your team’s success. Effortlessly manage employee attendance with real-time tracking, automated reports, and seamless integration. Simplify scheduling, monitor time-offs, and ensure compliance with ease

[ankit0020]

Best Remote Work Monitoring Software for Small Businesses

Discover the best remote work monitoring software tailored for small businesses. Boost productivity, track employee performance, ensure data security, and promote seamless collaboration. Explore user-friendly solutions that cater to the unique needs of smaller organizations. Stay connected and efficient while empowering your remote workforce for success.

[ahalts]

How Time and Attendance Systems Boost Employee Productivity

In today’s fast-paced business environment, managing time effectively is critical for both employees and employers. Time and attendance systems have evolved from simple punch cards to sophisticated digital solutions, offering a range of benefits that go beyond tracking work hours. Here’s how these systems play a crucial role in enhancing employee productivity.

1. Eliminating Manual Errors

Traditional timekeeping methods, such as manual logs or spreadsheets, are prone to human errors. Mistakes in recording work hours can lead to disputes, payroll inaccuracies, and wasted time resolving issues. Modern time and attendance systems automate these processes, ensuring accuracy and reducing administrative burdens, allowing employees to focus on their core tasks.

2. Streamlining Administrative Tasks

Automated time and attendance systems significantly reduce the time HR and managers spend on administrative duties. Tasks like tracking overtime, managing leave requests, and calculating payroll are streamlined, freeing up time for strategic initiatives and employee engagement efforts.

3. Enhancing Accountability

With precise time tracking, employees become more accountable for their schedules. Knowing that their attendance and work hours are being accurately monitored fosters discipline and reduces instances of tardiness or early departures.

4. Supporting Flexible Work Arrangements

Time and attendance systems often include features like remote clock-ins and mobile apps. This flexibility allows businesses to support remote work, hybrid models, and shift work efficiently. Employees can log their hours from anywhere, ensuring that productivity isn’t compromised by location.

5. Providing Real-Time Insights

Advanced systems offer analytics and reporting features, enabling managers to monitor workforce trends, identify bottlenecks, and optimize schedules. For example, tracking peak productivity hours or detecting patterns of absenteeism can help businesses make informed decisions to improve workflow.

6. Improving Employee Morale

When employees see that their hours are accurately tracked and reflected in timely, error-free payroll, it builds trust and satisfaction. Features like self-service portals also empower employees to check their attendance records, apply for leave, or view their schedules, fostering transparency and reducing confusion.

7. Encouraging Better Time Management

Time and attendance systems often include reminders and notifications for clock-ins, breaks, and deadlines. These prompts encourage employees to manage their time effectively and stay on task, contributing to higher productivity levels.

8. Ensuring Compliance

For businesses, staying compliant with labor laws and overtime regulations is essential. Time and attendance systems automatically calculate work hours and flag potential compliance issues, reducing the risk of legal complications. This allows employees to work confidently within the framework of labor laws.

9. Reducing Time Theft

Features like biometric clock-ins or geolocation tracking prevent practices such as buddy punching or unauthorized overtime. By minimizing time theft, businesses can save costs and allocate resources more effectively.

10. Optimizing Workforce Planning

With accurate data on employee availability and work hours, managers can create efficient schedules that balance workload distribution and avoid overburdening team members. This not only boosts productivity but also prevents burnout.

Conclusion

Time and attendance systems are more than just tools for tracking hours—they’re a powerful resource for enhancing productivity, improving workforce management, and building a transparent workplace culture. By adopting modern systems, businesses can save time, reduce errors, and empower employees to perform at their best.

More info: https://ahalts.com/solutions/hr-services/outsourcing-time-attendance

[trackolap]

How Can Employee Productivity Tracker Streamline Project Management?

In today's dynamic work environment, where deadlines loom and resources are often stretched thin, managing diverse projects with remote employees is one of the biggest challenges for managers. However, a centralized employee productivity tracker can be your trusted ally to monitor how your employees utilize their time and resources. Since this tool provides insightful data in real-time, organizations can seamlessly navigate through the complexities with greater clarity regarding project progress. 

Imagine a situation wherein every activity of your employee is visible remotely and a dashboard that paints a clear picture of the team’s performance, hidden insights into workflow, and overall business strategies. Sounds too good to be true, right? An employee tracking solution frees managers from guesswork as it offers accurate insights into the productivity levels of every team member, time taken to complete tasks, and employee performance. Also, it aids in identifying bottlenecks in the workflows. 

In this blog, we will highlight practical ways to manage diverse projects with remote employees by utilizing robust features of employee time-tracking apps for your better understanding. 

What is Employee Tracking Software?

Monitoring the productivity of your remote employees can be difficult when done manually through calls or emails. With the rising shift towards remote work environments, managers are finding it difficult to enhance work efficiency, drive scalability, and achieve overall business success. Hence, it is imperative for businesses to adapt innovative tools to manage remote teams and enhance productivity. 

In addition, TrackOlap employee monitoring software provides insightful data on several parameters in real-time, supporting businesses in making informed decisions and continuously enhancing workflows and other improvements. As a manager, you can observe employees' behavior during working hours, identify areas for improvement in team performance, and ensure the overall business operation thrives. 

Lastly, by tracking employees' activities and work efficiency through a central dashboard, managers can save time from constantly following up with employees and maximize ROI.

What Metrics Does Employee Productivity Tracker Record?

As mentioned above, an employee productivity tracker enables businesses to track team activities, productivity levels, and more. This enables managers to consistently track progress over varied projects, identify inaccuracies in real-time, and make adjustments promptly to avoid delayed submissions or interrupted workflows. Let us explore a range of metrics that this software offers to multiple businesses. 

Time Utilized: Average time spent on per task or project. Remote work management software offers a seamless data breakdown of where your resources spend time. 

Employee’s Idle Time: An employee time tracking app captures the total number of breaks or duration of time off amid working hours to help managers identify unproductive team members

Computer Activity: Tracks website, documents, and applications visited by employees during working hours to determine their active time

Completed Tasks: Based on the overall output delivery, employee tracking solution keeps a record on overall completed tasks to optimize resource allocation strategy for the team

Moreover, employee time-tracking app tends to answer a range of questions with added clarity:

At what time does the team log-in and log-out?

Who are the underperformers and top performers in the team?

What sites is the team viewing, and for how much time?

What resources do we need to acquire project objectives?

Where do we need to focus on to drive better revenue?

You May Also Like: How can Remote Work Management Software Enhance Business Operations? 

Why is there a sudden drop in the remote team’s performance?

The metrics of remote work management software collectively offer visibility to the managers for time management and overall productivity of the team to consistently improve business operations, workflows and other aspects hassle-free. 

Top Reason Why You Need Employee Productivity Tracker

Maintaining productivity is important for every business irrespective of what you do, and what you offer. It can become a complex process if you work with a remote team. Hence, implementing a robust employee productivity tracker is extremely important in today’s fast-paced world. Let us explore a few benefits of this software. 

1. Effective Project Management

Managers can effortlessly manage project schedules and essential assignments through a centralized employee time-tracking app. By accessing historical data on parameters like employee performance, caliber, productivity levels, and more - as a manager, you can schedule tasks or allocate assignments based on the timeframe. 

By constantly tracking their activities, you can immediately capture inaccuracies and find alternative solutions without interrupting the project's scheduled workflow. 

2. Strategic Resource Allocation

Consistently monitoring employees’ productivity levels through remote work management software aids in identifying areas of h igh and low efficiency in the team. This data will support you with planning strategic resource allocation and ensure equal workload distribution.

In addition, centralized dashboards are an additional benefit for managers to access an overview of the entire team’s activities. Whether it is project deadlines, allocating assignments according to employees' expertise, staffing level, or overall team workload capability, an employee productivity tracker can come to your rescue. 

3. Thorough Performance Analysis

Are you looking to re-align your allocation process? Access productivity levels and overall output delivered by your team members in previous weeks or months to determine their performance. Additionally, through graphically-rich reports, you will have a better picture of the overall team’s progress and encourage them to perform better from these analytics to drive better outcomes. 

4. Assess Return on Investment (ROI)

By tracking your team’s productivity levels through employee tracking solutions, you can also analyze the effectiveness of the investment you made in varied tools, resources, and more. Yes, you heard it right! You can evaluate the overall output delivered by your team, their efforts, or work efficiency to understand the profitability of your projects and make better decisions for future endeavors. 

5. Evaluate Workload Balance & Employee Burnouts

If your resource allocation strategy isn't optimized, or if you fail to manage equal workload within your team, your employees may feel burnout very frequently, which can ultimately affect their well-being. 

However, many factors can lead to employee burnout, such as an imbalance in workload for a longer period of time. When you track productivity levels, if you observe uneven results, such as high-performers being unproductive or a sudden drop in overall output delivery, then it is an indication that they are on the edge of experiencing burnout. 

Hence, it is important to set a realistic timeline for every delegated task, track achievable targets promptly, and ensure every employee has a suitable workload that is important for achieving project success. 

6. Track Goals and Achievements

Tackling your employees' efficiency levels aids in setting realistic goals. Regularly measuring progress for these objectives will keep you aligned with minute progress. Additionally, evaluating reports like productivity vs. targets acquired assists in motivating employees to work closely to achieve specific goals and encourages teams to be accountable for certain aspects. 

How to Manage Projects with Employee Tracking Solutions?

TrackOlap provides comprehensive software to manage projects, remote teams, and upscale business profitability with robust features. However, this software goes beyond productivity or time tracking as it offers valuable insights on many parameters that might otherwise go untapped. 

1. Tracks Time Autonomously

It is important to understand your objectives before you implement varied strategies. Based on your objectives, consider integrating a time tracker like TrackOlap to foster accountability and transparency into the workflow and avoid interrupting your employees' privacy. 

Since this software seamlessly tracks computer usage by activities, visited sites, documents, or apps, it helps managers access the active time of every employee. This can be helpful for organizations that have team members from different time zones. Moreover, these features remove the process of back-and-forth follow-ups, manual log-ins, and updating progress on every task. 

2. Setting Productivity Benchmarks

Employee tracking solutions simplify the process of identifying when employees are productive and when they trick the team with time theft. This can help managers address such concerns in real-time and collaborate with employees in 1:1 sessions to boost business growth. 

By encouraging employees to perform better and focusing on activities for employee development, you are likely to set high benchmarks for employee productivity. This approach will encourage team members to perform better and be focused, especially when their efforts are acknowledged and appreciated with a certain level of recognition. Ultimately, all these aspects will lead to better revenue, satisfied clients, and retained employees. 

3. Effective Project Budgeting

Managers can conduct a thorough project cost analysis through data-driven reports based on the employee's performance, productivity levels, and amount of output delivered in previous months. Based on this analysis, businesses can estimate an average feasible timeline to complete a project without causing burnout among team members and an overall budget to ensure you achieve significant profitability with your existing team. 

4. Customized Reporting and Analysis

Whether you want to determine the effectiveness of your resource allocation strategy, workflow efficiency, productivity levels, employee accountability, or team performance - TrackOlap simplifies the evaluation process by offering a robust feature for creating customizable reports based on specific parameters. 

Moreover, a centralized dashboard offers an overview and statistics that give the organizations a clear picture of varied aspects and departments, supporting consistently making informed decisions hassle-free. 

Final Thoughts

In today’s dynamic environment, an employee productivity tracker is valuable for businesses. It not only enhances productivity levels but also offers accurate data on work output and the effectiveness of varied strategies with clear visibility. Moreover, managers can easily manage teams and projects without micromanaging daily, thanks to features like idle time tracking, customized reports, and more metrics. 

Transform your business profitability and change how you manage projects by adopting a time-tracking tool into your system. Contact us to get a quick demo of these features today!

[remoteworktimetracking]

Adapting to the Future of Work in Modern Work Environments

The landscape of work is constantly evolving, and adapting to these changes is crucial for both employers and employees. To stay ahead of the curve, understanding the dynamics of modern work environments is essential. For an in-depth exploration of this topic, I highly recommend reading the insightful article on Deskcove: Modern Work Environments: Adapting to the Future of Work.

Embracing Change in the Workplace

This comprehensive article covers various aspects of modern work environments, highlighting the importance of flexibility, technology integration, and employee well-being. Here are some key takeaways:

Flexibility and Remote Work

The article discusses the growing trend of remote work and how businesses can adapt to this shift. It emphasizes the need for flexible work schedules and the benefits of remote work for both productivity and employee satisfaction.

Technology Integration

Integrating advanced technology is a cornerstone of modern work environments. The article explores how tools like collaboration software, cloud computing, and AI can streamline workflows and enhance efficiency.

Employee Well-Being

Ensuring the well-being of employees is more important than ever. The article provides insights into creating a supportive work culture that promotes mental health and work-life balance.

Why This Article is a Must-Read

For anyone looking to stay informed about the future of work, this article is a valuable resource. It offers practical advice and forward-thinking strategies that can help businesses and individuals thrive in modern work environments.

Final Thoughts

Adapting to the future of work requires a proactive approach and a willingness to embrace change. I encourage you to read the full article on Deskcove: Modern Work Environments: Adapting to the Future of Work. It’s packed with valuable insights that can help you navigate the evolving work landscape and ensure success in the years to come.

[superseemonitoring]

SuperSee is the ultimate solution for boosting team productivity. With cutting-edge employee monitoring and time-tracking tools, get real-time insights into activity and improve workplace efficiency. Achieve accountability and transparency with SuperSee.

[zappyhireglobal]

The Rise Of Remote Work: Key Remote Work Trends & Statistics

How can recruiters and hiring managers adapt to the evolving employment landscape, particularly with the growing demand for flexible work arrangements and the intricacies of remote work?

The rise of remote work has been a response to changing work dynamics, technological advancements, and a growing emphasis on work-life balance. 

It is now an intrinsic part of the professional world, offering the ability to tap into a broader talent pool but presenting challenges in hiring and management. 

As we explore the evolving landscape of work, it becomes evident that remote work is not just a temporary trend; it’s a pivotal shift that’s here to stay.

To remain at the forefront of the recruitment industry, HR professionals need to innovate their strategies for candidate engagement, support, and integration. Adapting to this change is essential for sustained success.

What is remote work?

Remote work, sometimes referred to as telecommuting, involves professionals executing their roles outside the traditional office setting.

This could be from their homes or shared working spaces. While technology has facilitated this transition, it requires effective communication, adaptability, and discipline from both employees and employers.

The rise of remote work and key remote work trends

This blog delves into the key remote work trends and statistics that have been shaping this new era of work, offering valuable insights for HR professionals and business leaders alike.

Download full infographic

[yaalibizappln]

⌚ A flextime employee may become lazy and misuse the flextime policy. With a flexible work schedule, you may not be able to supervise employees who work during non-traditional work hours.

For example, if you start working at 9 AM and an employee starts working at noon, you may not be able to monitor them after you leave the office.

Employees misuse flextime by leaving early or browsing social media during work hours. This can lead to a lack of productivity, lower morale, and a decrease in work quality.

⚠️ During a work-from-home situation, what steps can you take to avoid this kind of scenario?😯

Fortunately, you can supervise such employees using TrackmyTime.

TrackmyTime simplifies the monitoring and time tracking for employees.

TrackmyTime keeps track of and records your remote employee activities during working hours, no matter where they are located.

It can analyze productivity to see how your team's time is spent and automatically record time entries for hours worked on timesheets.

It can also notify you of any suspicious activity, such as extended breaks or working late or idle. This will keep your employees focused on tasks and working efficiently.

That's not at all! You can view the other interesting features here: Employee Flexi Time Tracking App

[timechamp12]

Best Ways to Introduce Productivity Monitoring to an Organization

How to introduce productivity monitoring to your organization? 

In any organization, large or small, public or private, there are always opportunities to increase productivity. Another alternative is to keep track of the productivity of your employees. You can do this in various ways, but it is essential to do it in a way that is respectful of employees' privacy and does not create a hostile work environment. Let us learn about it in detail. 

What is productivity monitoring software? 

Productivity monitoring software is a type of software that helps manage employees' workflow. It also helps ensure that employees are not wasting too much time on social media or other activities that do not contribute to their productivity. 

One can use the productivity monitoring tool in various ways depending on the company and its work culture. For instance, some companies use it to ensure that all their employees are working at least 40 hours a week, while others use it to monitor employees' time on social media or online shopping. 

Tips on how to introduce productivity monitoring to your organization 

To ensure that your organization runs as efficiently as possible, you may consider introducing productivity monitoring. You can discover areas where improvements can be made by charting employee productivity. 

To ensure you don't encounter any issues when implementing such a system, consider these things: 

1. Be Transparent to your Employees 

Employee monitoring is a controversial topic. Some people think monitoring employees is unethical, while others believe it's necessary to maintain productivity. To be transparent and make sure that the employees are happy, employers should have a set of clear rules on how they monitor their employees. 

Employers should also be okay with their employees about what they are tracking and why they are doing it. 

2. Communication: Update your employees and managers 

In a globalized and digitalized world, keeping employees updated with the latest information is necessary. Using different approaches to update employees, such as remote meetings, video conferences, or even online training, is essential. Communication is a vital component of your workplace. Quality-minded when it comes to how you communicate is just as important as what you actually say. 

3. Encourage Ownership: Share the data to improve productivity 

Employee monitoring is a process of tracking and recording employee's activities and helps managers analyze, evaluate and improve the performance of their employees. Employers can monitor their employee's productivity with a remote environment, flexible implementation, and tracking. The goal is to inform employees about what they are doing wrong and how to improve their performance. 

Employers can use this data to find out which team members are more productive than others. They can also see which tasks require more effort from the employee's side and should be prioritized accordingly. 

4. Ensure Remote culture 

Remote work culture is a relatively new concept, and it's one that many people are wary of. It helps to increase employee productivity and reduce absenteeism. To keep track of employees, companies use different tools that monitor their activity and location. The most popular tool is software that tracks employees' office hours, remote work hours, and breaks taken. 

Having a remote culture in an organization is crucial so that employees feel comfortable with the environment they are working in. It is vital to have a remote culture in an organization so that employees feel comfortable with the environment they are working in. 

5. Recognize Privacy Concerns 

With the prevalence of remote workers, flexible schedules, and remote settings, it's now more challenging to know what your employees are doing at home or at work. This can lead to many privacy concerns. There are many ways to implement employee tracking and monitoring, but choosing one that suits your needs best is essential.  

Observing your employees will help you keep track of their performance and ensure they are engaged in work in accordance with your expectations. The program will help you determine if any suspicious activity or actions are taking place over a remote distance. 

Ending Up the blog: 

To conclude, it is essential to consider all the potential risks and benefits of introducing productivity monitoring to your organization. Both efficient manual and automated forms of productivity tracking exist. As you decide if you'd like to implement productivity monitoring, it's a good idea to choose an approach that is respectful of your workers' privacy. 

You can use the Time Champ software to make it more effective among employees. The Time Champ  tool is an ideal way to keep track of employee productivity and identify areas where improvements are made. Implementing a productivity monitoring system can help your organization reach its full potential. 

[wanywheresolution]

Software developer productivity tools are designed to enhance efficiency, streamline workflows, and eliminate distractions for developers. These tools focus on coding, collaboration, task management, and automation to help developers deliver high-quality software faster.

[ankit0020]

Achieving Transparency with Remote Work Monitoring

Achieving transparency in remote work can be challenging. However, remote work monitoring software can track time spent on specific tasks and projects, evaluate the efficiency of remote work tools, and monitor virtual communication channels in real-time. This leads to increased visibility for employers, improved performance for remote teams, and fair compensation.

[wolfliving]

It starts with him

What was once a promise of technology to allow us to automate and analyze the environments in our physical spaces is now a heap of broken ideas and broken products. Technology products have been deployed en masse, our personal data collected and sold without our consent, and then abandoned as soon as companies strip mined all the profit they thought they could wring out. And why not? They already have our money.

The Philips Hue, poster child of the smart home, used to work entirely on your local network. After all, do you really need to connect to the Internet to control the lights in your own house?  Well you do now!Philips has announced it will require cloud accounts for all users—including users who had already purchased the hardware thinking they wouldn’t need an account (and the inevitable security breaches that come with it) to use their lights.

Will you really trust any promises from a company that unilaterally forces a change like this on you? Does the user actually benefit from any of this?

Matter in its current version … doesn’t really help resolve the key issue of the smart home, namely that most companies view smart homes as a way to sell more individual devices and generate recurring revenue.

It keeps happening. Stuff you bought isn’t yours because the company you bought it from can take away features and force you to do things you don’t want or need to do—ultimately because they want to make more money off of you. It’s frustrating, it’s exhausting, and it’s discouraging.

And it has stopped IoT for the rest of us in its tracks. Industrial IoT is doing great—data collection is the point for the customer. But the consumer electronics business model does not mesh with the expected lifespan of home products, and so enshittification began as soon as those first warranties ran out.

How can we reset the expectations we have of connected devices, so that they are again worthy of our trust and money? Before we can bring the promise back, we must deweaponize the technology.

Guidelines for the hardware producer

What we can do as engineers and business owners is make sure the stuff we’re building can’t be wielded as a lever against our own customers, and to show consumers how things could be. These are things we want consumers to expect and demand of manufacturers.

Control

Think local

Decouple

Open interfaces

Be a good citizen

1) Control over firmware updates.

You scream, “What about security updates!” But a company taking away a feature you use or requiring personal data for no reason is arguably a security flaw. 

We were once outraged when intangible software products went from something that remained unchanging on your computer, to a cloud service, with all the ephemerality that term promises. Now they’re coming for our tangible possessions.

No one should be able to do this with hardware that you own. Breaking functionality is entirely what security updates are supposed to prevent! A better checklist for firmware updates:

Allow users to control when and what updates they want to apply. 

Be thorough and clear as to what the update does and provide the ability to downgrade if needed. 

Separate security updates from feature additions or changes. 

Never force an update unless you are sure you want to accept (financial) responsibility for whatever you inadvertently break. 

Consider that you are sending software updates to other people’s hardware. Ask them for permission (which includes respecting “no”) before touching their stuff!

2) Do less on the Internet.

A large part of the security issues with IoT products stem from the Internet connectivity itself. Any server in the cloud has an attack surface, and now that means your physical devices do.

The solution here is “do less”. All functionality should be local-only unless it has a really good reason to use the Internet. Remotely controlling your lights while in your own house does not require the cloud and certainly does not require an account with your personal information attached to it. Limit the use of the cloud to only the functions that cannot work without it.

As a bonus, less networked functionality means fewer maintenance costs for you.

3) Decouple products and services.

It’s fine to need a cloud service. But making a product that requires a specific cloud service is a guarantee that it can be enshittified at any point later on, with no alternative for the user owner. 

Design products to be able to interact with other servers. You have sold someone hardware and now they own it, not you. They have a right to keep using it even if you shut down or break your servers. Allow them the ability to point their devices to another service. If you want them to use your service, make it worthwhile enough for them to choose you.

Finally, if your product has a heavy reliance on the cloud to work, consider enabling your users to self-host their own cloud tooling if they so desire. A lot of people are perfectly capable of doing this on their own and can help others do the same.

4) Use open and standard protocols and interfaces.

Most networked devices have no reason to use proprietary protocols, interfaces, and data formats. There are open standards with communities and software available for almost anything you could want to do. Re-inventing the wheel just wastes resources and makes it harder for users to keep using their stuff after you’re long gone. We did this with Twine, creating an encrypted protocol that minimized chatter, because we needed to squeeze battery life out of WiFi back when there weren’t good options.

If you do have a need for a proprietary protocol (and there are valid reasons to do so):

Document it. 

If possible, have a fallback option that uses an open standard. 

Provide tooling and software to interact with your custom protocols, at the very least enough for open source developers to be able to work with it. This goes for physical interfaces as much as it does for cloud protocols.

If the interface requires a custom-made, expensive, and/or hard-to-find tool to use, then consider using something else that is commonly available and off the shelf instead.

5) Be a good citizen.

Breaking paid-for functionality on other people’s stuff is inherently unethical. Consider not doing this! Enshittification is not a technical problem, it is a behavioral one. Offer better products that are designed to resist enshittification, and resist it yourself in everything you do.

Nothing forced Philips to do what they are doing: a human made a decision to do it. They could have just as easily chosen not to. With Twine’s server lock-in, at least we chose to keep it running, for 12 years now. Consider that you can still make a decent living by being honest and ethical towards the people who are, by purchasing your products, paying for your lifestyle. 

We didn’t get here by accident. Humans made choices that brought us to this point, and we can’t blame anyone for being turned off by it. But we can choose to do better. We can design better stuff. And we can choose not to mess things up after the fact.

We’re putting this into practice with Pickup. (We also think that part of an IoT reset is giving users the creative freedom of a general-purpose device.) If you’re looking for something better and our product can fill a need you have, consider backing us. We cannot claim to be perfect or have all of the answers, but we are absolutely going to try. The status quo sucks. Let’s do something about it.

Published October 15, 2023 By Jeremy Billheimer

[toptierteaser]

The Fitness App

Chapter One: Coach Hermes

“Dude, I swear by it! Six months! That’s all it took to whip me into shape! Two years of Pandemic fat gone like that! Trust me, you won’t regret it!”

                Diego’s words rang in Dylan’s memory as he stared down at the little earpiece in his hand. It looked like a little white snake, curled up in his softened palm. This was his last opportunity to back out, to put the thing back in the box and return it to the software store. He could get back in shape on his own, couldn’t he? if he just committed to going to the gym four times a week, documenting his workouts, journaling his food habits…

                He looked up at his reflection in the mirror. A husk of the former man he used to be. Or rather, it looked more like the hottie-with-a-body from the past had been stuffed into a suit made of dough, which had only expanded over the course of the last three years. His face still retained his former “adorableness,” as the ladies and gays at the office put it. He still had the good looks as the fat had hardly affected his face.

                But the rest of his body…it was an entirely different story. Just the sight of himself, standing alone in his room, was enough to make him blush. Everything had filled out. Exposed in his underwear, he looked first at the thighs which pressed up against each other like rising bread. His love handles that now jutted up over his waistband. The tight briefs he had not bothered to replace were covered in the front by the gut that had just begun to descend—a major factor in his deciding to try out this new technology—covering the front of his crotch and the fabric was beginning to rip on the sides because of the size of his ass. His butt had always been big for a guy’s, but now it was absolutely ‘ridiculous,’ as his friend, Cody, had teased, grabbing one of his juicy cheeks and giving it a jiggle. And of course, his tits had grown ripe, bouncy, his arms thickened not by muscle, but by fat, and his neck was slowly starting to plump up as well, teasing just the hint of a double chin.

He knew no amount of working out, writing down his exercises, keeping track of his calories would get him any closer to the fit jock he was over three years ago. It was a tried and failed recipe for disaster that had only resulted in him ballooning even fatter every time. Of course, during the pandemic, he had simply sat on his ass like everyone else and stuffed his face until he couldn’t fit another bite…but what was his excuse for the last two years?

At the beginning of the pandemic, there was no risk of being asked to go back into the office. Who knew how long that would last? And so, Dylan had kept on growing, kept on eating. But after a few years of remote work, the company had finally started to crack down on working-from-home, requiring a slightly-to-surprisingly chubbier office to return.

On the dreaded day, Dylan, after a morning of wrestling himself into the loosest chino’s he could find and wriggling into the only button-down that would button over his tubby gut, had waddled himself back into the building. He was shocked, stunned, and dismayed to find that out of all the dozens of employees, he had put on the most weight in his time larding out at home. And his coworkers were equally-stunned to see his new status. No one, upon smiling at him and greeting his return, could seem to keep their eyes from falling to size up his sized-up belly. And a few even made comments; his rival, Luke, who only looked fitter, more muscular, going so far as to poke his tummy.

It was already a miserable day. One which resulted in Dylan trying his best to drown out the associated feelings by glutting out on the snacks he had brought back to stock his desk. But to make matters worse, as he stood there, a granola bar dangling out of his mouth, restacking the papers on his desk, he watched as Diego, suited with brand new pants, a shirt, and shiny new shoes, came strutting into the office, looking at least fifty pounds thinner than the last time Dylan had seen him.

Diego had already been a thick-bodied man. Chubby, even. He had been so even a year before the pandemic, when both he and Dylan had started. The desk job had caused him to fill out quite quickly and by the time everyone was sent home to work, his obtuse ass cheeks could barely even fit into his pants. It was, perhaps, a lucky break for Diego that he could now work from home, as Dylan could see the seams on his buttocks starting to become unraveled as his doughy coworker waddled out the door.

But the pandemic went on, and so Diego’s weight went up. Dylan could see the changes during the zoom meetings, as his flawless brown skin was stretched tighter over the young man’s plumping face. Once, even, Diego had to stand to plug his computer back in and Dylan could see his lower half, clad only in a t-shirt and the tightest sweats Dylan could imagine his office friend wearing, his gut jiggling as it “bwomped” out from beneath his shirt, smacking against the keyboard on the desk.

That’s why it was a surprise when, two years later, Diego came strutting into the office, looking thinner than when he had started. Luke had elbowed his way to the front of the cluster who had walked up to congratulate him, feeling Diego’s muscles, running a hand over his stomach to check for abs through the fabric. The whole sight made Dylan want to puke. Instead, he stuffed a muffin into his face and glowered until they were called into the conference room.

It was a tighter fit than Dylan could remember, as he wedged his widened ass between the armrests of the chair. By accident, he was right beside his friend, Cora, and Diego. They had always been on good terms, but Dylan could hardly stand to look at him.

“What’s wrong, man?” Diego had asked.

Dylan didn’t hesitate. “How the fuck did you lose all that?” he spat. It came out far more volatile than he intended.

Diego looked slightly dejected, throwing up his hands. “Just wanted to take care of myself, man.”

Dylan softened his tone. “Sorry…it’s just. You, of all people…”

Diego laughed. “Would it make you feel better if I said that you were part of the inspiration? That I wanted to look like you did…you know…before.” He laughed, elbowing Dylan in the chubby side. Dylan couldn’t help but smile.

Diego glanced around. Everyone was busy chatting and celebrating each others’ return. He lowered his voice. “There’s an app…and a device. It’s called the ‘Encour Rager!’” Dylan gave him a look. “Cheesy, I know. But hey!” He looked down at his own body.

“What does it do?” asked Dylan.

                “It’s an A.I. trainer. It encourages you to work on your goals.” Diego chuckled. “And man is it brutal! But it’s effective. Which, clearly you might want to consider,” he glanced at Dylan’s stomach. Dylan squirmed.

                “I might give it a try,” he said absently. Of course, he didn’t know how he felt about A.I., but like everyone, he used it almost daily in some way or another. But he had already tried so many apps; calorie trackers, workout calculators. None of it had helped.

                Diego leaned in closer. “Listen, dude. It’s not like anything else you’ve tried. It’s a commitment. I don’t recommend it lightly. But once you buy it and put it in, it stays in there. You don’t take it out again for a year! I mean, it’s as close to permanent as you can get!”

All that flashed through Dylan’s mind now as he looked at himself. A tubby version of the hottie he so badly wanted to be again.

A small chirping sound went off from the device in his hand. He looked down to see it glowing blue. It was fully-charged. Now was the moment of truth. He could back out now, if he wanted to. He gave his thickened body one last glance in the mirror, catching a glimpse of the pile of clothes he had set aside because he no longer fit into them.

He clicked the button on the side of the earpiece, raised it, and inserted it into his ear.

A pleasant tune filled his brain. And then, a voice. “Hello, Dylan.” It was deeper than he had imagined. Masculine. He envisioned an attractive, muscular jock. “I’m your Coach. You can call me Coach if you like, or by my name, Coach Hermes.” ‘Hermes,’ the god of games and sports.

“Hello,’’ said Dylan awkwardly.

“Hello, Coach,” corrected the device.

“Hello, Coach,” said Dylan, smiling.

“Much better!” said the device. “Now, you are aware of my function, are you not?”

“I am,” said Dylan. “Coach Hermes,” he added, grinning.

“Very good. Just to recap, I will act as your personal fitness trainer for the next twelve months, during which time, we are going to whip your body into the shape you most desire! My function is to optimize your fitness level to suit your needs and to best-satiate your personal self-image. During our first week together, we’ll be getting to know one another quite well, and I will be observing and commenting on your lifestyle; your eating habits, your exercise routine, things like sleep schedule, how much television you consume. Does that all make sense to you, Dylan?”

“Yes, Coach,” said Dylan. He was growing placid, as if the voice was lulling him into a trance.

“Excellent, Dylan. Now, as I will be observing, I will also be curating a program which I believe will best-benefit your body…money-back guaranteed, of course. The watch that accompanies my earpiece will allow me to monitor your heart rate, your breathing, and your responses to my words. The contact lens will allow me to see the world through your eyes and will give me a customized projection which is designed to motivate you towards your fitness goals. Please go ahead and place the watch on your wrist at this time.”

Dylan did as he was told, strapping the watch onto his chubby wrist. “My, that’s a tight squeeze, isn’t it?” said Coach Hermes.

“Uh, a bit…” mumbled Dylan.

“I am reading that your pulse has been elevated. Might I suggest you do some deep breathing to calm your nerves. There is no need to be anxious. None of this is permanent until you give me the final say-so.” Dylan took some deep breaths.

“Now,” said Hermes. “Please place the contact in your eye…so I can get a good look at you.”

Again, Dylan obeyed, dropping the contact in front of the mirror, and blinking as he adjusted it into place. It was the smoothest contact he had ever worn. He could barely tell it was there!

“Very good!” said the Coach. “Oh…what a handsome dude.” Dylan was looking at his own face.

“Thanks, Coach!” said Dylan, half-forgetting he was talking to a robot.

“You’re welcome, Dylan,” said the robot. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind standing back a bit, so I can see you. You did remember to wear the minimum amount of clothing so I can see your full person, did you not?”

“Yes, Coach,” said Dylan to both question and request.

“VERY good! I can tell we’re going to whip you into shape faster than you could ever have thought imaginable! Now, please step back.”

Dylan stepped back, still put off by the quivering of his stomach as he did so. Still disturbed by the increased rubbing of his thighs.

“Oh!” said Hermes in a shocked voice. “Oh, my! You have lost control, haven’t you…big boy?”

Dylan blushed. Why he would do so in front of a robot was beyond him. But it was embarrassing nonetheless.

“No matter,” said Coach Hermes. “We can work with this. Can’t we, thiccums?”

“Uh…yes…?” stammered Dylan, questioningly. ‘thiccums?’

“Yes…?” said Hermes.

“Yes, Coach.”

“That’s better, fatty.”

Dylan nearly fell over. Diego had warned him the words of the A.I. could be harsh. But it would all worth it, when he came strutting into the office in a new suit…right?

“Well, now that I’ve gotten a good look at you, chubbs, there’s only one thing left to do. Your wristwatch will take your thumbprint as your signature.” As the app said this, Dylan felt the watch buzz, illuminating on the screen. “If you are prepared to commit for the next year, please go ahead and place your thumbprint on the screen at this time.”

Dylan hesitated. Could he really handle being called things like ‘chubbs’ and ‘fatty until this time next year?

“Or, you may decline the offer and return the app. Your one-day trial is cost-free so long as the device is returned to the nearest software provider without damage.” The voice dropped to a whisper in Dylan’s ear. “But, do you really want to look like this for the rest of your life, porker? You know that you won’t be able to do this without me, right, fatboy? You know you need my guidance. That’s what I’m here for. To help you. I’m nothing like those other apps, where you can lie to them about eating a salad before you go binge on a carton of ice cream. I’m the real deal. I see everything. I feel everything. Like how out of breath you are, just standing there. Like how I can tell by your pulse that you’re embarrassed. But you don’t want to be embarrassed for the rest of your chubby life, do you? Go on, biggums…sign the contract.”

Dylan looked down at his watch again. He raised his thumb over the screen, letting it hover.

“Sign. It,” hissed the app.

He couldn’t do it alone.

“Yes, Coach,” he said. And then he pressed his thumbprint down and held it against the screen.

“Very good, fatboy,” said the A.I. in his ear. “Now, we can begin our training!”

[teaseandsqueeze]

The Program: Chapter One

“Dude, I swear by it! Six months! That’s all it took to whip me into shape! Two years of Pandemic fat gone like that! Trust me, you won’t regret it!”

                Diego’s words rang in Dylan’s memory as he stared down at the little earpiece in his hand. It looked like a little white snake, curled up in his softened palm. This was his last opportunity to back out, to put the thing back in the box and return it to the software store. He could get back in shape on his own, couldn’t he? if he just committed to going to the gym four times a week, documenting his workouts, journaling his food habits…

                He looked up at his reflection in the mirror. A husk of the former man he used to be. Or rather, it looked more like the hottie-with-a-body from the past had been stuffed into a suit made of dough, which had only expanded over the course of the last three years. His face still retained his former “adorableness,” as the ladies and gays at the office put it. He still had the good looks as the fat had hardly affected his face.

                But the rest of his body…it was an entirely different story. Just the sight of himself, standing alone in his room, was enough to make him blush. Everything had filled out. Exposed in his underwear, he looked first at the thighs which pressed up against each other like rising bread. His love handles that now jutted up over his waistband. The tight briefs he had not bothered to replace were covered in the front by the gut that had just begun to descend—a major factor in his deciding to try out this new technology—covering the front of his crotch and the fabric was beginning to rip on the sides because of the size of his ass. His butt had always been big for a guy’s, but now it was absolutely ‘ridiculous,’ as his friend, Cody, had teased, grabbing one of his juicy cheeks and giving it a jiggle. And of course, his tits had grown ripe, bouncy, his arms thickened not by muscle, but by fat, and his neck was slowly starting to plump up as well, teasing just the hint of a double chin.

He knew no amount of working out, writing down his exercises, keeping track of his calories would get him any closer to the fit jock he was over three years ago. It was a tried and failed recipe for disaster that had only resulted in him ballooning even fatter every time. Of course, during the pandemic, he had simply sat on his ass like everyone else and stuffed his face until he couldn’t fit another bite…but what was his excuse for the last two years?

At the beginning of the pandemic, there was no risk of being asked to go back into the office. Who knew how long that would last? And so, Dylan had kept on growing, kept on eating. But after a few years of remote work, the company had finally started to crack down on working-from-home, requiring a slightly-to-surprisingly chubbier office to return.

On the dreaded day, Dylan, after a morning of wrestling himself into the loosest chino’s he could find and wriggling into the only button-down that would button over his tubby gut, had waddled himself back into the building. He was shocked, stunned, and dismayed to find that out of all the dozens of employees, he had put on the most weight in his time larding out at home. And his coworkers were equally-stunned to see his new status. No one, upon smiling at him and greeting his return, could seem to keep their eyes from falling to size up his sized-up belly. And a few even made comments; his rival, Luke, who only looked fitter, more muscular, going so far as to poke his tummy.

It was already a miserable day. One which resulted in Dylan trying his best to drown out the associated feelings by glutting out on the snacks he had brought back to stock his desk. But to make matters worse, as he stood there, a granola bar dangling out of his mouth, restacking the papers on his desk, he watched as Diego, suited with brand new pants, a shirt, and shiny new shoes, came strutting into the office, looking at least fifty pounds thinner than the last time Dylan had seen him.

Diego had already been a thick-bodied man. Chubby, even. He had been so even a year before the pandemic, when both he and Dylan had started. The desk job had caused him to fill out quite quickly and by the time everyone was sent home to work, his obtuse ass cheeks could barely even fit into his pants. It was, perhaps, a lucky break for Diego that he could now work from home, as Dylan could see the seams on his buttocks starting to become unraveled as his doughy coworker waddled out the door.

But the pandemic went on, and so Diego’s weight went up. Dylan could see the changes during the zoom meetings, as his flawless brown skin was stretched tighter over the young man’s plumping face. Once, even, Diego had to stand to plug his computer back in and Dylan could see his lower half, clad only in a t-shirt and the tightest sweats Dylan could imagine his office friend wearing, his gut jiggling as it “bwomped” out from beneath his shirt, smacking against the keyboard on the desk.

That’s why it was a surprise when, two years later, Diego came strutting into the office, looking thinner than when he had started. Luke had elbowed his way to the front of the cluster who had walked up to congratulate him, feeling Diego’s muscles, running a hand over his stomach to check for abs through the fabric. The whole sight made Dylan want to puke. Instead, he stuffed a muffin into his face and glowered until they were called into the conference room.

It was a tighter fit than Dylan could remember, as he wedged his widened ass between the armrests of the chair. By accident, he was right beside his friend, Cora, and Diego. They had always been on good terms, but Dylan could hardly stand to look at him.

“What’s wrong, man?” Diego had asked.

Dylan didn’t hesitate. “How the fuck did you lose all that?” he spat. It came out far more volatile than he intended.

Diego looked slightly dejected, throwing up his hands. “Just wanted to take care of myself, man.”

Dylan softened his tone. “Sorry…it’s just. You, of all people…”

Diego laughed. “Would it make you feel better if I said that you were part of the inspiration? That I wanted to look like you did…you know…before.” He laughed, elbowing Dylan in the chubby side. Dylan couldn’t help but smile.

Diego glanced around. Everyone was busy chatting and celebrating each others’ return. He lowered his voice. “There’s an app…and a device. It’s called the ‘Encour Rager!’” Dylan gave him a look. “Cheesy, I know. But hey!” He looked down at his own body.

“What does it do?” asked Dylan.

                “It’s an A.I. trainer. It encourages you to work on your goals.” Diego chuckled. “And man is it brutal! But it’s effective. Which, clearly you might want to consider,” he glanced at Dylan’s stomach. Dylan squirmed.

                “I might give it a try,” he said absently. Of course, he didn’t know how he felt about A.I., but like everyone, he used it almost daily in some way or another. But he had already tried so many apps; calorie trackers, workout calculators. None of it had helped.

                Diego leaned in closer. “Listen, dude. It’s not like anything else you’ve tried. It’s a commitment. I don’t recommend it lightly. But once you buy it and put it in, it stays in there. You don’t take it out again for a year! I mean, it’s as close to permanent as you can get!”

All that flashed through Dylan’s mind now as he looked at himself. A tubby version of the hottie he so badly wanted to be again.

A small chirping sound went off from the device in his hand. He looked down to see it glowing blue. It was fully-charged. Now was the moment of truth. He could back out now, if he wanted to. He gave his thickened body one last glance in the mirror, catching a glimpse of the pile of clothes he had set aside because he no longer fit into them.

He clicked the button on the side of the earpiece, raised it, and inserted it into his ear.

A pleasant tune filled his brain. And then, a voice. “Hello, Dylan.” It was deeper than he had imagined. Masculine. He envisioned an attractive, muscular jock. “I’m your Coach. You can call me Coach if you like, or by my name, Coach Hermes.” ‘Hermes,’ the god of games and sports.

“Hello,’’ said Dylan awkwardly.

“Hello, Coach,” corrected the device.

“Hello, Coach,” said Dylan, smiling.

“Much better!” said the device. “Now, you are aware of my function, are you not?”

“I am,” said Dylan. “Coach Hermes,” he added, grinning.

“Very good. Just to recap, I will act as your personal fitness trainer for the next twelve months, during which time, we are going to whip your body into the shape you most desire! My function is to optimize your fitness level to suit your needs and to best-satiate your personal self-image. During our first week together, we’ll be getting to know one another quite well, and I will be observing and commenting on your lifestyle; your eating habits, your exercise routine, things like sleep schedule, how much television you consume. Does that all make sense to you, Dylan?”

“Yes, Coach,” said Dylan. He was growing placid, as if the voice was lulling him into a trance.

“Excellent, Dylan. Now, as I will be observing, I will also be curating a program which I believe will best-benefit your body…money-back guaranteed, of course. The watch that accompanies my earpiece will allow me to monitor your heart rate, your breathing, and your responses to my words. The contact lens will allow me to see the world through your eyes and will give me a customized projection which is designed to motivate you towards your fitness goals. Please go ahead and place the watch on your wrist at this time.”

Dylan did as he was told, strapping the watch onto his chubby wrist. “My, that’s a tight squeeze, isn’t it?” said Coach Hermes.

“Uh, a bit…” mumbled Dylan.

“I am reading that your pulse has been elevated. Might I suggest you do some deep breathing to calm your nerves. There is no need to be anxious. None of this is permanent until you give me the final say-so.” Dylan took some deep breaths.

“Now,” said Hermes. “Please place the contact in your eye…so I can get a good look at you.”

Again, Dylan obeyed, dropping the contact in front of the mirror, and blinking as he adjusted it into place. It was the smoothest contact he had ever worn. He could barely tell it was there!

“Very good!” said the Coach. “Oh…what a handsome dude.” Dylan was looking at his own face.

“Thanks, Coach!” said Dylan, half-forgetting he was talking to a robot.

“You’re welcome, Dylan,” said the robot. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind standing back a bit, so I can see you. You did remember to wear the minimum amount of clothing so I can see your full person, did you not?”

“Yes, Coach,” said Dylan to both question and request.

“VERY good! I can tell we’re going to whip you into shape faster than you could ever have thought imaginable! Now, please step back.”

Dylan stepped back, still put off by the quivering of his stomach as he did so. Still disturbed by the increased rubbing of his thighs.

“Oh!” said Hermes in a shocked voice. “Oh, my! You have lost control, haven’t you…big boy?”

Dylan blushed. Why he would do so in front of a robot was beyond him. But it was embarrassing nonetheless.

“No matter,” said Coach Hermes. “We can work with this. Can’t we, thiccums?”

“Uh…yes…?” stammered Dylan, questioningly. ‘thiccums?’

“Yes…?” said Hermes.

“Yes, Coach.”

“That’s better, fatty.”

Dylan nearly fell over. Diego had warned him the words of the A.I. could be harsh. But it would all worth it, when he came strutting into the office in a new suit…right?

“Well, now that I’ve gotten a good look at you, chubbs, there’s only one thing left to do. Your wristwatch will take your thumbprint as your signature.” As the app said this, Dylan felt the watch buzz, illuminating on the screen. “If you are prepared to commit for the next year, please go ahead and place your thumbprint on the screen at this time.”

Dylan hesitated. Could he really handle being called things like ‘chubbs’ and ‘fatty until this time next year?

“Or, you may decline the offer and return the app. Your one-day trial is cost-free so long as the device is returned to the nearest software provider without damage.” The voice dropped to a whisper in Dylan’s ear. “But, do you really want to look like this for the rest of your life, porker? You know that you won’t be able to do this without me, right, fatboy? You know you need my guidance. That’s what I’m here for. To help you. I’m nothing like those other apps, where you can lie to them about eating a salad before you go binge on a carton of ice cream. I’m the real deal. I see everything. I feel everything. Like how out of breath you are, just standing there. Like how I can tell by your pulse that you’re embarrassed. But you don’t want to be embarrassed for the rest of your chubby life, do you? Go on, biggums…sign the contract.”

Dylan looked down at his watch again. He raised his thumb over the screen, letting it hover.

“Sign. It,” hissed the app.

He couldn’t do it alone.

“Yes, Coach,” he said. And then he pressed his thumbprint down and held it against the screen.

“Very good, fatboy,” said the A.I. in his ear. “Now, we can begin our training!”

[mariacallous]

Over the last decade, the Kremlin's most aggressive cyberwar unit, known as Sandworm, has focused its hacking campaigns on tormenting Ukraine, even more so since Russian president Vladimir Putin's full-scale invasion of Russia's neighbor. Now Microsoft is warning that a team within that notorious hacking group has shifted its targeting, indiscriminately working to breach networks worldwide—and, in the last year, has seemed to show a particular interest in networks in English-speaking Western countries.

On Wednesday, Microsoft's threat intelligence team published new research into a group within Sandworm that the company’s analysts are calling BadPilot. Microsoft describes the team as an “initial access operation” focused on breaching and gaining a foothold in victim networks before handing off that access to other hackers within Sandworm’s larger organization, which security researchers have for years identified as a unit of Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency. After BadPilot's initial breaches, other Sandworm hackers have used its intrusions to move within victim networks and carry out effects such as stealing information or launching cyberattacks, Microsoft says.

Microsoft describes BadPilot as initiating a high volume of intrusion attempts, casting a wide net and then sorting through the results to focus on particular victims. Over the last three years, the company says, the geography of the group's targeting has evolved: In 2022, it set its sights almost entirely on Ukraine, then broadened its hacking in 2023 to networks worldwide, and then shifted again in 2024 to home in on victims in the US, the UK, Canada and Australia.

“We see them spraying out their attempts at initial access, seeing what comes back, and then focusing on the targets they like,” says Sherrod DeGrippo, Microsoft’s director of threat intelligence strategy. “They’re picking and choosing what makes sense to focus on. And they are focusing on those Western countries.”

Microsoft didn't name any specific victims of BadPilot's intrusions, but broadly stated that the hacker group's targets have included “energy, oil and gas, telecommunications, shipping, arms manufacturing,” and “international governments.” On at least three occasions, Microsoft says, its operations have led to data-destroying cyberattacks carried out by Sandworm against Ukrainian targets.

As for the more recent focus on Western networks, Microsoft's DeGrippo hints that the group's interests have likely been more related to politics. “Global elections are probably a reason for that,” DeGrippo says. “That changing political landscape, I think, is a motivator to change tactics and to change targets.”

Over the more than three years that Microsoft has tracked BadPilot, the group has sought to gain access to victim networks using known but unpatched vulnerabilities in internet-facing software, exploiting hackable flaws in Microsoft Exchange and Outlook, as well as applications from OpenFire, JetBrains, and Zimbra. In its targeting of Western networks over the last year in particular, Microsoft warns that BadPilot has specifically exploited a vulnerability in the remote access tool Connectwise ScreenConnect and Fortinet FortiClient EMS, another application for centrally managing Fortinet's security software on PCs.

After exploiting those vulnerabilities, Microsoft found that BadPilot typically installs software that gives it persistent access to a victim machine, often with legitimate remote access tools like Atera Agent or Splashtop Remote Services. In some cases, in a more unique twist, it also sets up a victim's computer to run as so-called onion service on the Tor anonymity network, essentially turning it into a server that communicates via Tor's collection of proxy machines to hide its communications.

Another, separate report Tuesday from the cybersecurity firm EclecticIQ pointed to an entirely distinct hacking campaign that firm also ties to Sandworm. Since late 2023, EclecticIQ found the hacker group has used a malware-infected Windows piracy tool, distributed via Bittorrent, to breach Ukrainian government networks. In those cases, EclecticIQ found, the hackers have installed a remote access tool called Dark Crystal RAT to carry out cyberespionage.

Any sign of Sandworm, which Microsoft refers to by the name Seashell Blizzard, raises alarms in part because the group has a history of hacking operations that go far beyond mere spying. Over the last decade, the group has caused at least three blackouts by targeting electric utilities in Ukraine—still the only such hacker-induced blackouts in history. The group also released the NotPetya malware that spread worldwide and did at least $10 billion in damage, and it used wiper malware to destroy countless networks in more targeted attacks across Ukraine both before and after the 2022 invasion.

Microsoft has so far found no evidence that, in BadPilot's targeting of Western networks specifically, Sandworm has shown any intention to carry out anything other than espionage. “This seems very early in terms of initial resource gathering, trying to get this much persistent access,” says Microsoft's DeGrippo. “Then we would have to wait to see what they do with it.”

But she notes that BadPilot is nonetheless tied to a larger group that has a history of highly disruptive cyberattacks. “Therefore," says DeGrippo, "the potential actions that they could take next is of deep concern.”