Social media opens up companies and individuals to serious security problems, but it should be accepted that the use of social media platforms is not going to go away.
So said Richard Broeke, national sales manager for Securicom presenting at the ITWeb Social Media Summit 2014 in Bryanston yesterday.
He added that corporate and personal usage of social media platforms has increased, with 81% of fortune 500 companies using social media as a mechanism to do business and communicate.
According to Broeke, the use of social media by employees increases the risk of confidential company information being leaked by 50%, with a 40% increase in inappropriate intellectual property distribution.
He revealed that the problem with using social media platforms is that it makes it easy for people to share information which they normally wouldn't.
In addition, employees are distracted from core tasks by using social media technologies and could post content on external social sites which reflects negatively on the company, stated Broeke.
Also, employees engage in inappropriate discussions which can cause the company to be liable to a lawsuit.
Highlighting the risk of using social media, Broeke says that in 2013, six out of 10 CIOs interviewed by CIO Insight magazine in the US said that they suffered an average loss of $2 million due to security incidents around Web 2.0, which is the founding technology that enables social media.
To mitigate social media risks, Broeke believes that organisations should introduce comprehensive, easy-to-understand policies and procedures that highlight what the employees are allowed to do and not allowed to do.
He adds that having policies are not enough, but there needs to be ongoing training on the risks associated with social media.
Also, companies need to use technology solutions to secure mobile access Internet usage and the flow of information through content management systems, said Broeke.
He concluded by saying companies should protect their social media credentials to limit risk of stolen information and hacking.
Share