I'm using a burner account for this.
I recently left a start-up where I worked closely with the founder and used my personal laptop for the whole duration of my time there. They promised that a company laptop would be provided but month after month rolled by and I would be told 'next month'. Other employees were provided with company laptops. Apart from the shitty pay, and general shit experience, I came to the realization that my manager was monitoring my laptop and doing so after working hours, nosing in on my personal leisurely browsing.
There were many giveaways, almost as if she was trying to tell me that she was doing this but the most obvious being:
- Reciting parts of my personal writings back to me (emails/ journal entries etc) during 1-1 meetings.
- Knowing my weekend plans before I told her.
- I noticed after a while my laptop would frequently glitch, freeze, and black lines across the screen. I thought this was extremely weird as it's quite new (windows surface studio) and I've had it for just over 4 months and I've never experienced it before. I'm not sure if this is an issue with the laptop or something indicating that there is interference with my laptop. I'm still experiencing this even after leaving the company.
I'm not very tech-savvy and I downloaded quite a lot of files from my time there. I would really appreciate any advice or if you've been in similar situations etc.