Facebook And Twitter's Corporate Problem

If the multibillion-dollar e-mail security industry has been built to prevent information from seeping out through personal communication, how is social networking in the workplace still going unchecked? After all, consumer social apps such as Facebook and Twitter provide the same information-leakage threat as unsecured, personal e-mail–possibly more, thanks to the viral impact of broadcasting news tidbits to one’s network of friends in real-time.

This question of enterprise social networking security has played out repeatedly in recent months as I watch Facebook and Twitter cross the digital divide from personal to business communications tools. For the most part, social networking has crept into the workplace with very little oversight by IT because people are gradually–and often stealthily–discovering a second purpose (business) for their personal accounts.

Sure, we see the occasional social-networking crackdown: In August ESPN sent out a memo banning reporters from sports-related tweets; about the same time, the Marine Corps banned Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and other social media sites from its networks. But usage policies like ESPN’s and the Marines’ are just a Band-aid approach to their security problems. They ignore the fact that, like corporate e-mail, there is a bona fide need for collaborative tools in the workplace.

For companies seeking a secure a middle ground between outright Twitter-bans and free-for-all tweeting, the answer lies in taking a corporate e-mail approach to social networking in the workplace. Companies need to deploy an enterprise social networking solution– social collaboration software developed specifically for business–that is managed by their IT departments. And we’re seeing more and more activity surfacing that addresses this business need for secure social collaboration.

Earlier this month, Cisco ( CSCO – news – people ) announced its Enterprise Collaboration Platform, a broad set of tools for IM, e-mail, social networking, videoconferencing and document and video sharing. The approach is not unlike similar collaboration projects by IBM ( IBM – news – people ) and Microsoft ( MSFT – news – people ).

A slew of start-ups have also entered this market. DiVitas Networks, for example, makes a social networking Web app that is geared toward private, intra-company communications among mobile users. The solution supports a corporate directory (so-called “friends,” in Facebook lingo) and is accessible directly from an iPhone and other smart phones. Software security is controlled at the server level, so there is no security risk if the phone is lost or stolen.