Social Networking at Work – Yes or No

A new report revealed that hackers are increasingly targeting social networking services like Twitter and Facebook. Many employees who log on during the day at work might be causing information security risks at their companies. But banning the technologies would be short-sighted.

Here is the crazy article by C.G Lynch from CIO.com

As more workers spend a greater part of their days on social networks like Facebook and Twitter, hackers have turned their energies toward spreading their malware across those services, harming workstations and company networks.

That’s the contention of a recent report measuring Web 2.0 targeted hacks that occurred the first quarter of this year that was conducted by the Secure Enterprise 2.0 Forum and industry group aimed at enabling the safe use of social media in the word place. 

Increasingly, hackers have turned their attentions away from e-mail, in part due to the fact people spend more of their time communicating with friends, family and colleagues over mediums like Facebook and Twitter. In addition, the e-mail environment has reached a level of maturity that makes the new frontier of social networks more attractive to hackers and spammers.

The list of security hacks on Web 2.0 and social networking sites were impressive, the report found. Nearly one-fifth were caused by authentication hacking (where someone is able to gather user names and passwords). Others included database hacking (21 percent), content spoofing (11 percent) and cross site scripting (XSS), an incident where malicious code runs on a webpage and eventually can enable phishing attacks.

The consequences of these types of hacks can be incredibly harmful. According to the report, nearly 30 percent lead to the leakage of sensitive information. Around 13 percent resulted in actual monetary loss, while more than 10 percent installed malware on computers or their corresponding networks.

The report will most likely fuel the resolve of CIOs and heads of technology that have banned social networking sites in the work place.  By most measures, nearly half of all employees have gone that route out of concerns of security & productivity.

However, a company called Worklight takes on a different approach with the results of the study.  They say that these social networking sites provide a server that allows them to move company information over portals like Facebook and iGoogle without it living on the servers of those sites.     Worklight claims that it allows employees to stay safely on their favorite consumer sites to connect with customers & partners. 

Currently some CIO’s have been willing to use these tools but at times been reluctant due to anecdotal stories about security breaches.  This crazy report will allow them to know what the threats are and make informed decisions about letting users access the sites.  

Who knows.  I love interacting with people on facebook and I think as long as people are not stupid & open emails and crazy phising fake messages, people don’t send company information over facebook things should be ok.  But again that boils down to the same issue with security policies within corporate email etc.  Just need to hire and employee smart, honest, not stupid people.  Easy enough right?

 

My Name is E

The Next Web conference in Amsterdam announced the winner of their startup competition.   My name is E lets you share contacts via mobile like a super charged business card.  The trick is that instead of letting you share a Vcard, it also lets you connect to other peoples social networks automatically without all of the tedious email inviting when you get back home/office.  Very cool.  I just signed up & I’m going to give it a tryer.

Google is building a Social Network Under Our Noses…

So I read this article on Digg.. and yes I am sure Google is building a social network & 3249283042834 other things.   You know that they tried to build Orkut and that was a failure… but they are not giving up in the social netorking area…  I filled out a little profile but I am really not interested.  I really think that the early bird gets the worm here.  I am not interested in changing from Facebook to Google.. just like Google was late on their “Google Talk”.  Who wants to have 324324 instant messages.  I already have Yahoo, AIM and MSN.  No thanks on another one.  I am already on Linked-in, Facebook & that is PLENTY for 1 person.  Sorry Google but I think you are waisting your time on this one. 

Ok here is the Digg article..

Facebook: Social Network –>Apps.
Google: Apps–>Social Network

Facebook’s attempts at developing an OS on the back of its social network has shown impressive uptake amongst developers but left many users aggravated because of mostly useless application notifications. Google have built best of breed web applications and have gradually introduced social interactions within them; Gmail with Gtalk, Maps with Latitude, Google Reader with sharing and commenting features, iGoogle with tab sharing.All these sites and others are all neatly connected via a Google Bar (that need better customization options) stretched across the top of all your Google apps.

Additionally, with Google’s App Engine increasingly gaining popularity, we should continue to see impressive applications launch outweighing Facebook’s in usership and developer control. Google are creating a platform with apps far superior to the likes of those on Facebook with OpenSocial and App Engine as its backbone.

The Google Profile and Vanity URL’s.

The Google profile has, albeit slowly, seen small progressive developments in recent months.

Introduced just over a year ago,  Google introduced them as:

 

“…simply how you represent yourself on Google products — it lets you tell others a bit more about who you are and what you’re all about. You control what goes into your Google Profile, sharing as much (or as little) as you’d like.”

Google also recently introduced linking and integrating other services into your Google profile by suggesting other sites that you may use. There is still much more room for development here, possibly a social stream?

Google’s latest step (discovered byGoogle Operating System) sees them allow users to add a name to their Google Profiles, creating what has come to be known as Vanity URL’s. This dinky little step, in one smooth move reintroduces Google into the social networking arena. Yahoo and MSN have had profiles for years now, but the integration between their various services has been far from successful – clunky may even be the word. Also, try asking any Yahoo or MSN user how to get to their profile, Google’s URL’s are now straight forward, www.google.com/profiles/NAME (create your own here).

What’s Missing?

Well, primarily, there is no easy way to “add a friend” and have them added to all the various sharing capabilities built into some of Google’s services. On visiting a user’s profiles, there is no “add to friends” button, although you are able to connect to people via Google Reader, Gtalk and the Google Friend Connect service – all these need to be streamlined.

Secondly, the friend stream. There’s a huge potential for improvement and expansion in the friend stream, leading the way right now is Friendfeed – ironically lead by two ex-Googlers. I still maintain, I would love to see Google acquire Friendfeed – but that’s for a different post altogether.

Thirdly, deeper integration and better design. We need to see more obvious and transparent integration of Google’s services within their more popular apps, as I mentioned above, Gmail, Reader, iGoogle and others have seen integration to a degree, this needs to be taken to another level. In regard to design, let me be clear: their ability to simplify issues and create incredibly usable applications that often shatter competitors is incredibly impressive. However, what we do miss with Google is what Facebook did initially have (and don’t any more), that immediate understanding of exactly how to be social using the tools provided.

Who knows…

What is Digg up to…???

So last week Business Week reported that Digg’s 2008 revenue is projected to be $8.5 million with $5.3 million in losses.

Digg has over 70 employees and is rumored to grow to 150 by the end of next year.  That is a awful large amount of people for a company that outsources sales & content creation.

There is a little rumor out there that they are working on a self advertising product that is somewhat similar to Google Ad Words but with a twist.  The product would insert advertisements into Digg news streams.  And where the ads end up and how much an advertiser pays for them would be based on user feedback.    So users would have the ability to vote on advertisements based in the same way they vote on stories.  The better ads, as determined by Digg users, will get better placement & a lower price per click.   Who knows if this rumor is true & how close Digg is to making it live.  

But hopefully something good is in the works.  With that large revenue loss & still hiring more people, something has got to be happening.   Overall Digg has been really successful at leveraging their users to sort through the news to determine what is hot and what is not.  That would be great if they could do the same with advertising.

Facebook at work?

Good or bad?

There are many personal benefits of facebook at work.. time goes by quicker, keeping track of long lost buddies, seeing what your friends are up to, entertainment etc….

But is it really a good idea to allow your users to access Facebook while working?  Allowing them to spend time thinking of creative ways to update their status,  upload family and friend photos, endless stream of personal email chains, happy birthday notes, adding green patches, becoming Cubs fans.. .etc??

I know that many companies allow it, mostly sales companies that want their sales people to increase their social network, sales etc.  Ok I get it.  But do the numbers really match up?  Facebook is addicting & can be very time consuming.  

Here is one of my typical facebook experience, after I have emailed all of the friends that have sent emails and responded to the instant messages online.  Who is that old college room mate with the blonde hair.. what’s her name..? She was really fun.. Maybe Katie has her in her friend profile.. no not there.. Oh! But Yasmin is there! I miss her too!  I’ll friend Yasmin.. what has she been up to?  Oh! And that reminds me of an ex-boyfriend.  I wonder what he is up to..  Ok 45 min later.. I am sure my experience is not too unique.

Seriously this can go on  & on.  Personally I think Facebook should not be used in a traditional work place environment.   There is plenty of time to poke people, write long emails, work on your facebook garden..? Or whatever facebook pleasures you have after work hours.  But that is just my opinion.  If you have an opinion on the matter please jump in and comment.