Monthly Newsletter December 2007
Who's using Facebook?
Recent coverage in the media, for example The Times and The Register, has highlighted the current craze for Facebook which has a UK audience of over 3.2 million. Companies across the UK, large and small, are now concerned that access to Facebook and other such 'social networking' web sites are exposing their organisation to loss of productivity and their networks to security risks.
Simply trusting employees not to use these sites is not enough; recent independent research commissioned by Websense revealed that 25% of UK employees said they couldn't live without accessing online communities like Facebook during their working day.
People join Facebook because its fun and addictive, not because its a secure environment. Anyone placing personal information on social networking sites needs to consider there is no guarantee their data will remain secure and confidential. Individuals and businesses need to take responsibility to ensure safe and secure Internet use. Too often security is seen as an afterthought.
Web 2.0 applications create security and productivity challenges for businesses. The Websense research also discovered that employees are spending an average of 2.5 hours a week surfing the web for personal reasons during the working day, but this can be as much as 4 hours per day in some cases. Imagine a company where 100 employees are spending 30 minutes of work time on Facebook every day. That equals 250 hours of lost productivity each week. Now multiply that by the minimum hourly wage, and you can see that the cost of that lost time is £1,337.50; increase the average hourly wage to £11 (the national median) and the cost becomes £2,750 per week!
Companies like Websense can make web security simple and effective for organisations by layering security on top of the company's existing systems to provide security no matter where their people are. Call GSS now on 0870 458 1113 for details of how to evaluate Websense and to discover who's a fiendish Facebook fan.
Click here for more information on Websense
This story was originally featured in the GSS Monthly Newsletter December 2007
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