Clean desk vs clear desk

In my last post of clear desk policy, I mentioned that there is a difference between clean desk and clear desk. A clean desk is self explanatory. It's got to be clean. A clear desk, on the other hand, means that all important documents should not be left on the desk. They should be stored away in drawers and locked.

The reason for this is to prevent loss of data. If someone who is not the employee of the company got into the company (poor security perhaps), this person could get highly confidential information which can be lying anywhere on the desk. For this reason, employees are encouraged to lock everything up at the end of the day.

In the Clear Desk Policy information of my company, it was mentioned that one company was fined by FSA because confidential data from a certain company (not my company!) was leaked out.

Such reasons aside, sometimes we might have written information on papers which we wouldn't want any colleague to see, so it's always good to have a clear desk at the end of the day. No one can use any information against you. I started being careful about what I left on my desk after some papers from my desk went missing after the bosses in my company found out that I attended an interview with a different company. Lucky for me, I had no information on the interview written in those papers. Sneaky bosses? I think so.