What exactly are "work hours?"

By
Frank Cabri
 on May 7, 2008 8:57 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

At 3 pm today, I was in my office working on my expense reports. A colleague here at FaceTime popped his head in and said "you do your expense reports during work hours?"

 

What exactly are work hours?

 

For professional workers, there is no such thing any more. That's pretty clear to me, as I get ready to post this around 9 pm. Joe McKendrick over at the FastForward blog thinks so too.  The lines between work and personal life continue to blur. Expense reports, employee reviews, press releases, product plans... they all need to get done, and it doesn't really matter when you work on them. My guess is that if employers started saying "your work hours are 8 to 5" there would be a lot less work accomplished. No one at FaceTime would ever attempt to define my work hours, for this very reason.

 

Thumbnail image for bigstockphoto_Basketball_121866.jpgIn contrast, though, my neighbor told me recently that the NCAA Web site was blocked by his employer during March Madness - so he called in sick on a Thursday to watch a day of college basketball from home since he couldn't get to it while at work. 

 

Scenarios like this play out in companies all over the world every day. And when employers block or put limits on what their employees can do, does it really solve the problem?  Or create a bigger one?

 

We've seen time and time again that users will continue to do what they need and want to do.  Take something as simple as setting email size restrictions - users will find a work around, either using their personal Web mail or a file transfer via IM. Are you better off with that outcome?

 

According to Wordtracker, over the last 100 days there were a little over 20 Google/Web searches related to "block facebook."  Presumably a combination of IT Managers, parents and educators are looking for information about how to restrict access to social networking. 

 

But contrast that with the 359 searches by users looking to "unblock facebook."  In total, more than 10,000 searches were made in the same period related to unblocking websites, social networking sites, using anonymizers, proxies and other related searches. 

 

We're always socializing. We're always working.  And users will always look for the work around when they are cut off from either.

 

Everything Old is New Again: Enterprise 2.0 is the new Public IM

By
Eric Young
 on April 25, 2008 8:00 AM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I saw some interesting articles from the NY Times and the Enterprise 2.0 blog  last week about the vast number of Web 2.0 applications that are being used in corporate America - even though IT security feels that they have their environments locked down to prevent these apps from being used.  In his Enterprise 2.0 blog, Steve Wylie commented on the NYT article, pointing out that "the reality is that these apps are here to stay."

 

We've been tracking this trend for several years, and it's definitely growing - in fact, many companies are now facing the reality head on. I spoke with a large pharma org in NJ very recently that mentioned they have already setup MySpace and Facebook pages to allow their corporate users to collaborate internally and externally using these tools. 

Although this is probably frightening and new information for many security and compliance execs, this is the same trend we've seen happening since 2001 when this issue first appeared with the emergence of public IM usage within corporations.  The customers we spoke with back then told us the same story that people are saying today which is, the user population feels that they should be able to use these applications because they make them more productive, responsive and connected employees. 

 

From an IM perspective, this feeling turned out to be 100% true which is why so many companies are now broadly rolling out Enterprise IM and UC solutions.  Based on that history, its important for executives to quickly understand that this trend will continue and if they want their organizations to stay relevant and competitive, they should move to implement solutions that allow for the enablement of these applications so they can be used in a secure and compliant fashion to take advantage of their value, rather than spend time and money trying to find ways to block their use outright.

 

A recent SC Magazine article also covers this trend very well. With Generation Z's arrival in the workforce, IT faces a new group of workers who have "never taken a breath of air without being able to Google."

 

What's your opinion? Block or enable?

IT Concern over Social Networking: 95%

By
Frank Cabri
 on April 11, 2008 6:44 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Another RSA event is in the books.  It was a good week, and I always find it invaluable to have conversations with the IT mangers that are in the trenches

 

FaceTimeBooth_RSA.JPGWe also ran what I would describe as a completely unscientific survey, but thought the information would be worth sharing here. We surveyed more than 300 attendees who participated in our theater presentation on Web security, to get their thoughts on a few things. One thing that stood out was their concern over social networking. 95% of the respondents said they were "concerned" (45%) or "very concerned" (40%) about "Users accessing social networking sites from the corporate network."  Of course, this level of concern is to be expected at a security conference.   Only 8% said they had "no concerns."  

 

Is the high level of concern misplaced?  This information, along with the general comments of many of the IT people I spoke with suggests that the biggest threat for 2008 is clear: It's the employees themselves.

 

Vamosi-Boyd_FTBooth.JPGAlso at RSA, our chief malware researcher, Chris Boyd (aka Paperghost), held a well-attended session with CNET senior news editor Robert Vamosi covering the habits of a new generation of young hackers targeting social networking. In addition to Vamosi's coverage and Boyd's VitalSecurity blog, InfoWorld has a nice recap of the session.

 

Social Networking Goes to Work

By
Frank Cabri
 on April 7, 2008 12:01 PM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

It appears that social networking is everywhere these days, and especially on the enterprise network.  We've unveiled an update to our Unified Security Gateway today, which allows IT managers to control, monitor and report on which applications employees are using within Facebook -  over 20,000 applications today. We truly believe that social networking can be a productive business tool, and customers are asking for help as they work to understand it and how to apply it to their business.

 

As the WSJ's Business Technology blog commented, some people are still skeptical of how social networking helps businesses.  I know I use LinkedIn as my key address book for professional contacts, and know I would be less productive without it.  How are you using social networking to do your job?   We've heard from customers in energy, pharmaceuticals and financials among others that their employees are using it - in some cases it's the HR teams to run informal background checks on new hire candidates.

 

We'll be asking some of these same questions to IT professional at the RSA conference and plan to report back here what we've learned.  Speaking of RSA, it didn't get off to a great start for attendees en route from Heathrow.  Our own Chris Boyd, Director of Malware Research at FaceTime, blogs and shares photos here on a terrifying flight.  Glad to report he's arrived safely in San Francisco.

 

Welcome to the FaceTime Blog - FaceForward

By
Kailash Ambwani
 on April 2, 2008 8:46 AM | | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

In a classic case of the "cobbler's kids" we at FaceTime, who are dedicated to enabling businesses to benefit from Web 2.0 technologies, find ourselves lagging in the adoption of some of those same technologies!

 

In the daily grind of running an emerging company (tracking product milestones, meeting prospects and customers, assuaging investors) it is easy to lose sight of the long term value of real-time communication and collaboration. These technologies help shorten decision cycles, foster better communication - both internal and external - and, as a result, lead to higher sales and lower cost.

 

But, they do require investment. Of time, people and money. Why not wait till later?  Do we really need to do this now?

 

Well, you're already doing it. Or rather, your user base is already using these tools. In our latest annual Greynet Survey we found that 74% of enterprise end-users were using one or more public instant messaging networks from work.

 

In fact over half of the enterprise users we surveyed were using more than eight Web 2.0 applications (what we call greynets) - IM, P2P, video, etc. - at work. According to the Pew Research Center, fully two thirds of Americans between the ages of 18 - 29 use social networking sites. These are the new workers of today, and they are bringing these tools into the enterprise.

 

While these technologies deliver multiple benefits, they also pose a variety of risks: new channels for malware attacks, unmonitored data leakage, and potential compliance/e-discovery violations.  The challenge for IT managers is how to leverage the benefits of these tools and platforms while securing against myriad risks inherent in their use.

 

That is where FaceTime comes in. Our mission is to enable our customers to leverage the benefits of Web and unified communications by delivering security, management and compliance across the broadest set of enterprise, consumer and Web 2.0 applications.

 

I would love to hear what you are doing with these technologies, what your concerns are and how FaceTime can help you meet them.

 

I look forward to collaborating with you!

 

Kailash

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