This happened at my workplace on Monday morning aswell. I do not work in a company with American-based offices, though.
Linked
in was put on a restrictive 5 minute rule (Which HR would burn through
by 10am), Facebook, Twitter and a handful of other sites were banned
outright.
Because I'm a helpdesk monkey, I'm taking the calls and
logging this issue. HR cant look at LinkedIn for applications, another
group has hired two users specifically for Facebook and Twitter. Many
site workers (Who FIFO and go 2+ weeks without seeing their
family/friends) call in to request if it was intended.
I got told
by the rest of Group IT that Websense must have rolled through a change
and we had to apply to Websense to revert them for our company.
An
hour or two later, and a batch of emails to anyone remotely interested,
I get informed that it was one power-hungry sys-admin who had just
inherited the web filtering system. All social networking is evil
apparently, and it's our job to restrict it. I haven't heard of any
campaigns against social networking at work, and everyone has
smartphones now so what's the point to outright ban them?
His fix
was even more rediculous: Take down the internet for an entire floor
that Group HR (and another division) reside in (No warning or change
request), then give the entire floor Social Networking access. Never
mind the Recruiters not in Group HR, or the HR staff who work on site,
who use LinkedIN for work. Or telling anyone about making a change that
affects the entire company.