Security Bullet In
Communiques from the security front, sir
Thursday 7 February 2008, 5:27 PM
IT company implodes - trial by blog
Web 2.0 technologies hold both great promise and great danger for companies. On the one hand, their efficient use can encourage customer and employee interaction, and boost the profile of the company in a very valuable way. On the other hand, they can be extremely damaging to companies if employees, or ex-employees, decide to vent their grievances online.
There have been two instances recently of Web 2.0 creating a storm for the organisations involved.
The first is the implosion of a UK risk management company called Zeda. The
PreviousComments on this post
A risk management comapny that couldn't foresee the risk of publishing un-moderated comments? No wonder they went out of business!
The concept can work depending on the type of business; if you sell goods or services, a user forum is usefull because most of the conversation will be between users (free support), a blog is a bad idea but if you absolutely must have one, moderate the comments.
Apologies, I didn't make it clear enough that the article about Zeda, and the comments on the article, were actually in an online publication - the Nottingham Evening Post - , rather than on the Zeda website.
Nevertheless, your comments hold true -- it's apparent the company didn't see the risk to it of the approaching "credit crunch", while unmoderated blogs can spell disaster for any company.
Talking to experts from Pinsent Masons solicitors on this subject recently, they advised companies to have a very explicit policy on blogging. If organisations wish to allow employee blogs, they should be very clear about policy on posts which defame the company or bring it into disrepute.
It's all very well having strict policy on what you can and cannot put on a post, comment or blog but if we start to go down the road of screening such material when we don't like the content then people will stop using them. I agree we should screen offensive content but only where it is considered an offense in law.
