“We have clear policies around sexual harassment and workplace behavior and there have been and will continue to be consequences for anyone who violates them.’’ “Verkada is committed to creating a workplace that is respectful and inclusive of everyone,” the spokesperson said. Verkada also has “refocused how we recruit and hire diverse candidates,” according to the spokesperson. “They’re sending out very frequent updates on a daily basis as they’re investigating, and making sure this is an experience that is not repeated," Botha said.ĭuring the last year, Verkada has expanded its human resources team, completed a gender pay equity review and made compensation adjustments, implemented new training programs and strengthened mechanisms that employees can use to report abusive behavior with a 24/7 anonymous hotline, the company said. ![]() In an appearance on Bloomberg TV in March, Sequoia Capital’s Roelof Botha praised Verkada for swiftly reacting to the breach. In-office celebrations could include champagne toasts but didn’t mean employees were intoxicated. In a statement, a Verkada spokesperson said, “We acknowledge that early on, our internal policies did not initially keep pace with our rapid growth however, we have taken several steps to ensure we are creating a supportive and inclusive environment.’’ A party celebrating the company’s first $100 million in sales, during which many employees didn’t wear masks despite the pandemic, was “a lapse in judgement,” the spokesperson said.“Excessive drinking in the office and illicit drug use of any kind - both of which are grounds for termination - have never been commonplace at Verkada,” the spokesperson said. “Verkada gives frat boys a bad name,” one former sales employee said. ![]() Video footage of female employees was passed among male colleagues, who offered graphic comments, and in-office parties - even during the pandemic - were prone to excessive drinking and occasional drug use, according to the employees. In the weeks since then, current and former employees have told Bloomberg that the inattention to data protection was emblematic of a larger “bro culture” that was sophomoric and sales obsessed, and which tolerated the harassment of women, frequent partying and misleading marketing claims. and cybersecurity firm Cloudflare Inc.Īlthough some sales staffers allegedly marketed Verkada as “virtually unhackable,” the breach exposed alarmingly lax safeguards at a company selling powerful surveillance tools that include facial recognition technology and that promised security and privacy protections to go with them. Once little known outside of Silicon Valley, Verkada gained unwanted notoriety in March after Bloomberg reported that hackers had accessed the internet-connected cameras in facilities of its customers, including the carmaker Tesla Inc. “We understand that this definitely kind of made it difficult to trust us.” In response to another customer’s query, he summed up the mood. ![]() Verkada Chief Executive Officer Filip Kaliszan told Thomas that access had already been disabled. One pointed question came from Sequoia Capital, Verkada's most prominent investor: How, inquired Silas Thomas, information technology manager at the venture capital firm, can we cut off Verkada employees from access to Sequoia’s cameras? On a webinar with Verkada’s CEO, users wanted answers. Hackers had breached footage from thousands of surveillance devices trained on their operations, including schools, prisons, hospitals and companies around the world. (Bloomberg) - Verkada Inc.'s security camera customers were livid.
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