Madison Who’s Who Blog

Social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace (peer-to-peer networks) are potential security risks to companies. IT security and control firm Sophos warned that a large number of Facebook profile pages contain users’ current employment details which could be used by cyber criminals to commit corporate fraud, or enter into company networks.

A survey conducted by Sophos found that 41% of Facebook users were prepared to divulge personal information to a complete stranger. And firms are beginning to catch on to the dangers, as a separate poll of 600 workers found that 43% were denied access to Facebook by their company, while 7% said that usage was restricted to specific business requirements only.

Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos said, “more businesses are restricting access to these kinds of sites. Companies are increasingly looking to secure and control their workers’ web activity because of the impact it can have on the company in terms of productivity, bandwidth, and security.

(Source)

Peer to peer networking almost seems to take on a life force on it’s own, creating an inexorable momentum, a tidal wave in front of which corporations must bow. Or get sterner leadership.

When one company attempted to prohibit it’s staff from using social networking site FaceBook, a minor mutiny quickly reversed their position.

“Allen & Overy (A&O) has been forced into an embarrassing climb-down after the firm’s IT department was bombarded with staff complaints following a firmwide ban on social networking website Facebook.

IT chiefs took the decision to block access to the website due to concerns that staff downloading videos from the site would compromise the performance of A&O’s IT systems.

However, a series of complaints from staff across the firm led IT director Dave Burwell to email the entire London office on Tuesday (22 May) saying the ban had been lifted.

He said: “Given that there has been a strong reaction to the blocking and that Facebook is used by many people for networking – for business purposes as well as social – we are going to open up access to the site again.”
(source)

The corporate world, indeed every business owner is dancing this two step as they try to calibrate company policy to address the impact of social networking on every level. Indeed, the medium provides a powerful business tool, but I am hard pressed to see FaceBook as fertile grounds unless that is your specific target market. Policy needs to be quite firm. No matter what the ultimate benefits are to social networking tools, the subversive side of their capabilities should be noted. (Google “Digg  mutiny”  to see an example.)

People networking in public spaces such as FaceBook or MySpace need to be conscious of the biographical trail of crumbs that they are leaving. Though authenticity is a highly regarded commodity on the Internet,it isn’t always necessary to attach a real name to any online endeavors unrelated to your professional career.

“I can think of a lot of people who will Google a name just before they go out on a date. So if your potential employer Googles a name and sees your social life, that can be good, but it can also hinder you.
[…]
Just because HR professionals aren’t looking at profiles so much right now, that doesn’t mean that won’t happen because something like FaceBook is becoming extremely popular.

I think the caution I have is that you can find out a lot of information about people. Some of it depends on whether you want everyone at your workplace and people in those networks to know.

Anything of a personal nature on a blog, be it politics, a controversial lifestyle, religious views or a journal of your dating life needs to be shielded by sticking with a pseudonym and taking other precautions to conceal an identity.

“I think it will really come back, sooner than later, to haunt them. And people are very cavalier about the Internet space and it’s unfortunate. Google your name often. Negative Internet comments are like tattoos; they’re permanent.”
(Source)

Anything attached to your name should be executed with a view that one day that material could be read by a potential employer. On the Internet, you are the author of your own biographical who’s who material and you’ll want to edit it with caution.

Though the classic high school year book can not be considered a who’s who by strict definition, they never the less serve as the biographical component of a a who’s who by providing a four year time capsule through which to view a student’s life. Those who later gain fame are usually rather embarrassed when the media digs into their high school era via these venerable records and if you weren’t that flamboyant a student, your rather thin history will suggest that your greatest achievement was that you showed up for pictures for four years running.
Well, as so many things have changed with the Internet, so has the traditional, soon to be lamented, high school year book.

“Today, popular online communities like MySpace and Facebook are usurping a role that once belonged to paper yearbooks; the result is an open dig into the archaeology of youth. Here inside their digital lockers are snapshots of the tribe: They mug for webcam shots, stow MP3s, and flog their friend lists. They meticulously broadcast all manner of hopes, dreams, and whims. Testimonials for friends and crushworthy strangers abound. “Autographs are the most important part of a yearbook,” says Catherine Cook, a Skillman, New Jersey, high school student. “It’s all about finding out what people think of you.”

That’s been the case for quite some time now. But online, at the social networking sites, every day is signing day, and the venerable yearbook senior blurb is being replaced by profile pages that are updated as frequently as teenage tastes require. Best of all, this playground of personality is almost always supervision-free.
[…]
Even beyond the world of high school, the demise of the dead-tree yearbook is proceeding apace. According to The Kansas City Star, only 100 of the Associated Collegiate Press’s 700-member organizations still publish yearbooks. After 114 years, the University of Texas is thinking about axing its traditional yearbook, which sold to only 5 percent of enrolled students in 2005. Likewise, the University of Missouri’s Samitar folded after publishing annually since 1894, to be survived by a web-only version.”
from JeffMacIntyre.com

A telecommunications firm’s new service marketing campaign was subject to a marketing study that revealed that those in a given customer’s already existing social network were more likely to buy a service or product than those outside of the customer’s network. Or, simply put, ‘word of mouth’ still sells product.

“The researchers focused on a large telecommunications firm that was marketing a new Internet-based communications service. The company organized a direct-mail campaign to target potential customers for the service using various demographic and geographic characteristics. Because the service involved new technology, the targeted group was deemed likely to be interested in high tech.

The company also made a marketing pitch to another group — people who were “network neighbors,” meaning they communicated with an existing customer of the service. (Company records allowed the researchers to see who communicated with whom, though names were kept anonymous.) “People who communicated with a customer who already had the service were more likely to purchase the product than people not communicating with someone in the network, about 3.4 times more likely,” Hill says.”

Though the study focused on a telecommunications social network, the possibilities offered by MySpace,Facebook and other network communities are evident.

“While the research focuses on people linked by way of a telecommunications company, the findings can apply to other social networks, such as MySpace and Facebook, according to Hill. “What these networks are enabling you to do is find likely customers who you may not have complete information on. The networks enable you to find potential customers who are linked to your existing customer base.”
from Knowledge@Wharton

And what about privacy? ZDNet blogger Ed Gottsman had this comment:

“Asked about the privacy issues arising from this use of customer data, Professor Hill (in a refreshingly frank comment) said, “[F]irms own their customers’ data–including e-mail content and MySpace messages–and legally can use it for such purposes as target marketing.” This is reminiscent of Scott McNealy’s sympathetic 1999 effort to reassure those of us who fear creeping privacy invasion: “You have zero privacy already. Get over it.”