SOCIAL BUSINESS

Study Highlights Corporate Social Media Security Risks

Alison Diana | Date: 10-19-11 | Comments

In a new study, 63 percent of respondents say that employees' use of social media puts their organizations' security at risk. But only 29 percent state they have the necessary security controls in place to mitigate or reduce the risks.

As organizations expand their use of social media to communicate with consumers, partners and suppliers, they are tapping Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and blogs, and encouraging employees across departments to interact with the world beyond their corporate walls. But like any freedom, the liberty to interconnect via social networking can come at a price as some organizations have found.

A new Ponemon Institute study of more than 4,600 IT professionals in 10-plus countries found that 63 percent of respondents agree that employees� use of social media puts their organizations� security at risk. In contrast, only 29 percent say they have the necessary security controls in place to mitigate or reduce the risk posed by social media used in the work force.

And what are the biggest concerns? Organizations are most concerned with employees downloading applications or widgets from social-media sites, and posting uncensored content and uncensored blog entries, the study found. In addition, employees are spending some of their work hours using social media for non-employment activities (Farmville, perhaps?). And social media is increasingly the entry point for malware infections.

All of this social media use�both work-approved and unauthorized personal use�consumes a lot of bandwidth. Video, in particular, eats up a lot of network power, storage space and speed. In fact, 77 percent of those surveyed say they have seen or expect to see diminished bandwidth at their organization. As a result, companies are increasing their network bandwidth to accommodate the increased, and growing, use of social networking in the workplace, Ponemon said.

So how can organizations keep the lines of social-media communication open, yet protect themselves and keep IT costs within budget?

Respondents consider technologies such as antivirus and anti-malware, secure Web gateway (SWG), and identity and access management to be most important in countering the increased threat of malware. Other important security-related technologies include mobile-device management, data-loss prevention, network intelligence, device level encryption, an encryption solution, content-aware firewalls, IPS and IDS, and a database security solution, Ponemon found.

Security is not the only concern. Chief marketing officers also struggle with the sheer volume of the unstructured data consumers are creating in blogs, comments, videos and other social-media formats, according to a recent IBM study of CMOs. Today, 56 percent of CMOs view social media as a key engagement channel, but they still struggle with capturing valuable customer insight from the unstructured data that customers and potential customers produce, IBM�s report said.

CMOs also must determine the return on their social-media investment, in part a result of the current economic environment.

Marketing executives also should become more personally vested and aware of the technological tools at their disposal. When asked which attributes they will need to be personally successful over the next three to five years, only 28 percent said technological competence, 25 percent said social media expertise, and 16 percent said financial acumen, IBM�s study reported.

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