Workplace investigations have become a critical function in modern organizations. Whether the trigger is suspected data theft, employee misconduct, time fraud, or a regulatory audit, the quality of evidence your monitoring platform can produce often determines whether an investigation reaches a conclusive outcome or stalls for lack of documentation.
Veriato and EmpMonitor represent two distinct approaches to this challenge. Veriato has operated in the enterprise security and insider risk management space for over 25 years, building a platform around behavioral analytics, AI-driven risk scoring, and investigation-grade audit trails. EmpMonitor takes a broader approach, combining workforce productivity monitoring with security-grade features, including keystroke logging, screenshot capture, USB tracking, and live screen visibility, at a price point and deployment complexity that makes it accessible to organizations well below the enterprise tier.
This comparison examines both platforms across the dimensions that matter most in an investigation context: monitoring depth, evidence quality, ease of deployment, pricing, and the specific use cases each tool handles best.
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Workplace Investigations Are Going Digital
The shift to remote and hybrid work has fundamentally changed how organizations conduct internal investigations. When employees work from a central office, much of the evidence gathering in a misconduct or data misuse case can rely on physical access to devices, to colleagues, to physical records. In a distributed environment, that option largely disappears.
Digital workplace investigation software fills that gap by creating continuous, auditable records of employee activity. When an incident occurs, a data breach, a harassment complaint, or suspected policy violations, a well-deployed monitoring platform can provide timestamped evidence of exactly what happened, on which applications, and in what sequence. Without that infrastructure in place before an incident occurs, organizations are often left reconstructing events from incomplete logs and employee recollections.
The risk of not monitoring is measurable. According to industry research, insider threats account for a significant proportion of data breaches, and the average cost of an insider-related incident runs into the hundreds of thousands of dollars when legal exposure, remediation, and reputational impact are included. Workplace investigation software is increasingly viewed not as a surveillance tool but as a risk management investment, particularly in industries handling regulated data or intellectual property.
What Is EmpMonitor? A Modern Workplace Investigation Software
Overview of EmpMonitor
EmpMonitor is a cloud-based employee monitoring and workforce productivity platform that serves remote, hybrid, and on-premise organizations. Founded in 2014, it positions itself as a comprehensive solution that covers both productivity management and security-grade monitoring within a single platform. It is particularly well-suited to SMBs and mid-market companies that need investigation-capable monitoring without the implementation complexity or cost of enterprise-tier security platforms.
The platform operates via a lightweight agent installed on company-managed devices. Administrators access all monitoring data through a centralized cloud dashboard, with role-based access controls limiting visibility to authorized personnel. The agent can run in stealth mode, with no visible indicator on the employee’s device, which is relevant in directed investigation scenarios where alerting the subject would compromise the evidence-gathering process.
Key Investigation Features of EmpMonitor
From an investigation standpoint, EmpMonitor offers a feature set that covers most of the evidence types relevant to workplace misconduct, time fraud, and data misuse cases:
- Screenshot monitoring: Time-stamped screenshots captured at configurable intervals across all plan tiers, providing visual evidence of what was on screen at any given time.
- Screen recording: Automatic video-style activity capture creates a reviewable timeline of session activity, not just snapshots, but a sequential record of what was done and when.
- Keystroke logging: Records all keyboard input across active applications, providing content-level evidence of what was typed, in which applications, and at what times.
- Application and website tracking: Detailed logs of every application opened and website visited, with duration data and productivity categorization.
- File activity logs: Tracks file access, creation, modification, and deletion events, providing evidence of data handling relevant to misuse investigations.
- USB device detection: Alerts when external storage devices are connected and logs file transfer activity to and from those devices, critical for data exfiltration investigations.
- Live screen monitoring: Administrators can view any enrolled employee’s desktop in real time, which is relevant for active investigations requiring real-time visibility.
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How EmpMonitor Supports Workplace Investigations
EmpMonitor’s investigation utility extends across several common case types. In time theft investigations, where an employee claims working hours they did not actually log, the combination of login/logout times, active versus idle time data, application usage logs, and screenshots creates a comprehensive evidentiary picture that is difficult to dispute. In data misuse cases, USB tracking and file activity logs can establish whether sensitive data was accessed and transferred to unauthorized storage. For remote employee misconduct investigations, the stealth mode deployment and live screen capability allow administrators to gather evidence without alerting the subject prematurely.
What Is Veriato? Enterprise-Grade Investigation Monitoring
Veriato Platform Overview
Veriato is one of the oldest and most established names in employee monitoring and insider risk management, having operated in the space for over 25 years. The platform has evolved from a straightforward monitoring tool into a sophisticated behavioral analytics and insider risk management solution, with two core product lines: Veriato UAM (User Activity Monitoring) for real-time workforce visibility, and Veriato Cerebral, its AI-powered insider risk management platform. It serves enterprises, government agencies, and regulated-industry organizations across more than 70 countries.
Veriato Investigation and Surveillance Features
Veriato’s feature set is among the most comprehensive available in the employee monitoring category. Core capabilities include application and website monitoring, keystroke logging, screenshot and video capture, email and instant message content tracking, file movement monitoring, USB and printer usage logging, and network usage analysis. The platform can also monitor dark web activity, tracking access to .onion URLs, a capability not found in most competitor platforms and directly relevant to organizations managing insider threat programs.
Insider Threat Detection With Veriato
Where Veriato most clearly differentiates from productivity monitoring tools is in its behavioral analytics layer. The platform uses AI and machine learning to establish behavioral baselines for individual users, then flags anomalies that deviate from those baselines, unusual file access patterns, after-hours activity, sentiment shifts in written communications, or changes in application usage that may indicate disengagement or malicious intent.
Veriato’s psycholinguistic analysis capability, which monitors and analyzes the language and tone of employee emails and messages, tracking sentiment over time and flagging deviations, is a particularly distinctive feature. It is designed to identify early warning signals of disgruntlement, potential data theft planning, or policy violations before they escalate into incidents. Predictive risk scoring assigns individual users a dynamic risk level based on aggregated behavioral signals, allowing security teams to prioritize attention on the highest-risk individuals.
Veriato vs EmpMonitor: Feature Comparison for Workplace Investigations
Ease Of Use And Deployment
EmpMonitor Setup and Usability
EmpMonitor is designed for deployment by IT generalists rather than dedicated security teams. Agent installation is straightforward; administrators download the installer from the cloud dashboard and deploy it across endpoints, either manually or via group policy for larger organizations. The dashboard is functional and accessible to non-technical managers, and most organizations report being operationally live within a day of starting installation. Stealth mode configuration requires no specialized technical knowledge.
The trade-off is in reporting depth. EmpMonitor’s dashboard surfaces activity data clearly, but building custom reports or configuring advanced alert rules requires more manual setup than the platform’s clean interface might suggest. Organizations with complex investigation workflows may find the reporting layer requires more configuration effort than initially expected.
Veriato Implementation Complexity
Veriato, particularly its Cerebral insider risk management product, is a more complex platform that benefits from, and in practice often requires, a dedicated security administrator or team to configure and manage effectively. The behavioral analytics engine requires a baseline establishment period before meaningful anomaly detection begins, and the psycholinguistic and risk scoring features require tuning to minimize false positive alerts in practice.
Multiple user reviews note a steep learning curve and an interface that, while functional, feels dated compared to newer SaaS platforms. For organizations without dedicated security staff, Veriato’s complexity can translate into underutilization of its most sophisticated features. That said, for organizations with the resources to implement it properly, the depth of investigation capability it provides is difficult to match.
Cloud vs On-Premise Options
Both platforms support cloud deployment. Veriato additionally offers on-premise deployment for organizations with data sovereignty requirements or security policies that prohibit cloud-based monitoring data storage, a relevant distinction for government agencies and regulated enterprises. EmpMonitor is cloud-native and does not offer on-premise deployment, which is a meaningful constraint for certain compliance environments.
Pricing Comparison: Veriato vs EmpMonitor
EmpMonitor Pricing Structure
EmpMonitor uses a volume-based pricing model where the per-user rate decreases as team size grows, a structure that meaningfully rewards scale and makes it accessible to organizations at various stages of growth.
All EmpMonitor plans include the full feature set, including keystroke logging, screenshot monitoring, USB tracking, and live screen monitoring, with no feature paywalls between tiers. A 15-day free trial is available with no credit card required, covering up to five users with complete feature access.
Veriato Enterprise Pricing
Veriato publishes pricing for its UAM plan starting at approximately $11.25/user/month with a minimum of five users, and its more advanced UAM tier with additional capabilities at around $22.50/user/month. Veriato Cerebral, the full insider risk management platform with behavioral analytics and psycholinguistic analysis, operates on a custom enterprise pricing model, available on request. In practice, Cerebral is priced for organizations with dedicated security budgets, typically at the enterprise tier.
The pricing gap between the two platforms is material. A 50-person team on EmpMonitor’s Silver plan pays approximately $2,298 per year. The same team on Veriato’s entry UAM plan would pay approximately $6,750 per year, nearly three times more, before accounting for the additional cost of Cerebral’s behavioral analytics capabilities. For organizations evaluating investigation tools on a constrained budget, this difference is often decisive.
Budget-Friendly Veriato Alternative
For organizations that need investigation-capable monitoring, screenshots, keystroke logs, file activity records, USB tracking, but cannot justify Veriato’s enterprise pricing or implementation overhead, EmpMonitor covers the core evidentiary feature set at a fraction of the cost. The capabilities it does not offer, behavioral baseline modeling, psycholinguistic analysis, predictive risk scoring, are valuable in high-security enterprise contexts, but represent a level of sophistication that most SMB and mid-market investigations do not require.
Investigation Use Cases: Which Tool Fits Better?
HR Misconduct Investigations
For standard HR misconduct cases, policy violations, inappropriate communications, and time theft, EmpMonitor provides sufficient evidentiary capability. Keystroke logs, application usage records, and time-stamped screenshots create a defensible evidence trail without requiring behavioral AI. EmpMonitor handles the majority of HR investigation scenarios encountered by SMBs and mid-market organizations effectively and at a cost that is proportionate to the risk level.
Insider Threat Investigations
This is where Veriato has a genuine and significant advantage. Insider threat investigations, particularly those involving sophisticated employees who are deliberately attempting to conceal their activity, benefit from behavioral baseline modeling and anomaly detection in ways that activity logs alone cannot provide. An employee who accesses sensitive files at slightly unusual times, communicates with decreasing positivity over several months, and begins copying data in small increments may not trigger threshold-based alerts but will register as a risk anomaly in Veriato Cerebral’s behavioral scoring. For organizations in high-risk industries, such as financial services, defense contractors, healthcare, and government, Veriato’s insider risk management capability is the right investment.
Remote Workforce Monitoring
Both platforms handle remote workforce investigations competently. EmpMonitor’s live screen monitoring, stealth mode deployment, and cloud-accessible dashboard make it practical for investigating remote employees without requiring physical access to the device. Veriato offers equivalent remote investigation capability with the addition of deeper behavioral context. For most remote investigation scenarios, EmpMonitor’s capabilities are sufficient; the behavioral analytics layer Veriato adds becomes relevant primarily in high-stakes cases.
Compliance and Legal Investigations
Both platforms can support compliance investigations, providing audit-ready activity logs with timestamps. Veriato’s advantage in this context is the comprehensiveness of its logging, including email content, IM messages, and behavioral analytics, which creates a richer evidence record for regulatory audits or legal proceedings. EmpMonitor’s file activity logs, keystroke records, and screenshot history are sufficient for many compliance scenarios, but organizations with extensive regulatory obligations, particularly in HIPAA, SOX, or government security frameworks, may find Veriato’s depth of documentation more appropriate.
Why EmpMonitor Is a Strong Veriato Alternative
For most organizations evaluating workplace investigation software, the decision between Veriato and EmpMonitor comes down to three practical questions: What level of investigation depth do you actually need? What is your available budget? And what implementation complexity can your team manage?
On all three dimensions, EmpMonitor presents a compelling case for organizations below the enterprise tier. It covers the core evidentiary feature set, keystroke logs, screenshots, screen recordings, USB tracking, file activity, and live screen monitoring, which the majority of workplace investigations rely on. It deploys in hours rather than days or weeks. And its volume-based pricing structure means a 50-person organization pays under $2,300 per year for full monitoring capability, compared to several multiples of that for Veriato’s equivalent coverage.
The capabilities EmpMonitor does not offer, behavioral baseline modeling, psycholinguistic analysis, predictive risk scoring, and email content monitoring, are genuinely valuable in high-security enterprise environments with active insider threat programs. For organizations that need those capabilities, Veriato is the appropriate investment. For the broader population of SMBs, agencies, IT firms, and remote-first organizations that need reliable investigation-grade monitoring without enterprise complexity or cost, EmpMonitor delivers better value per dollar across the features that matter most in practice.
How To Choose The Right Workplace Investigation Software
Conclusion: Veriato vs EmpMonitor
Veriato is a technically superior platform in the narrow context of enterprise insider risk management. Its behavioral analytics engine, psycholinguistic analysis, and AI-driven risk scoring represent capabilities that no other platform in the monitoring category fully replicates. For large organizations in high-risk industries with dedicated security teams, active insider threat programs, and the budget and implementation resources to deploy Veriato properly, it is the right choice.
However, that description applies to a relatively small proportion of the organizations evaluating workplace investigation software. For the majority, SMBs, digital agencies, IT firms, remote-first companies, and mid-market organizations, EmpMonitor provides the investigation-grade monitoring capabilities that their actual use cases require, at a price that is proportionate to the scale of their operations, with a deployment process that does not demand dedicated security expertise.
The evidence types that resolve most workplace investigations, timestamped screenshots, keystroke logs, application and website records, file activity data, and USB tracking, are present and accessible in EmpMonitor at every plan tier. Organizations that have been evaluating Veriato primarily because it is a well-known name in the investigation monitoring space should run EmpMonitor’s 15-day free trial before making a final decision. For most, it will cover what they need at a fraction of the cost.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best Veriato alternative?
EmpMonitor is the strongest Veriato alternative for organizations that need investigation-grade monitoring without enterprise-tier pricing or implementation complexity. It covers keystroke logging, screenshot capture, screen recording, USB tracking, file activity monitoring, and live screen visibility, the core feature set required for most workplace investigations, starting at $3.00/user/month on annual billing. For organizations specifically requiring behavioral baseline analytics and psycholinguistic analysis, Teramind is a closer technical alternative to Veriato Cerebral, though at a higher price point than EmpMonitor.
Is EmpMonitor good for workplace investigations?
Yes, for the majority of workplace investigation scenarios. EmpMonitor provides timestamped screenshots, keystroke logs, application and website usage records, file activity data, USB device tracking, and screen recording, all of which constitute defensible evidence in HR misconduct, time fraud, data misuse, and remote workforce investigation cases. Its stealth mode deployment ensures the subject is not alerted during an active investigation. It is not the right tool for organizations that require behavioral anomaly detection or psycholinguistic sentiment analysis as part of their investigation framework.
Which tool is better for insider threat detection?
Veriato, specifically its Cerebral platform, is the stronger tool for proactive insider threat detection. Its AI-driven behavioral baseline modeling, predictive risk scoring, and psycholinguistic analysis of email communications are designed for identifying potential threats before they escalate, capabilities that EmpMonitor does not currently offer. EmpMonitor can support reactive insider threat investigations once a concern has been identified, but it does not provide the proactive behavioral intelligence that Veriato Cerebral delivers.
What software is used for workplace investigations?
The most commonly deployed platforms for workplace investigations include EmpMonitor, Veriato, Teramind, and InterGuard, depending on the organization’s size, industry, and investigation requirements. For SMBs and mid-market organizations, EmpMonitor and Teramind are the most accessible options. For enterprise and government deployments with active insider threat programs, Veriato Cerebral and Teramind’s DLP edition are the leading choices. The right selection depends on whether the primary need is evidence collection, which most platforms support, or proactive behavioral risk detection, which requires more specialized platforms.
Is employee investigation monitoring legal?
Yes, in most jurisdictions, when deployed on company-owned devices with appropriate disclosure to employees. In the United States, federal law broadly permits workplace monitoring, though states including Connecticut, Delaware, and New York require written notice before monitoring begins. In the European Union, GDPR mandates that monitoring be proportionate to a legitimate business purpose, that employees be informed, and that data retention periods be defined. In all cases, organizations should issue a written monitoring policy before deployment and restrict data access to personnel with a legitimate investigative need. Both EmpMonitor and Veriato support compliant deployment configurations, and both vendors recommend transparent monitoring policies as a standard practice.
