Instant Messaging and Communication


What is your view on Instant Messaging friend or foe? Many believe it offers little benefit and wastes a lot of end user time. Companies look to stop the proliferation of such services.

The Radicati Group estimated recently that Instant Messaging is present in at least 85% of all companies worldwide and you may not realise it but it is probably in your company. The total number of unsecured public IM users (e.g. MSN Messenger, AOL and Yahoo) is in excess of 125 million.

However, rather than trying to stop you users from using this unsecured systems why not embrace them into your own controlled, audited and secured IM environment, such as Microsoft Live Communications Server.


The risks

There are numerous risks in leaving unmanaged IM systems in your environment. In a Radicati study, these included:

  • Threats to enterprise security introduction of viruses and worms, identity theft and spoofing

  • Failure to comply with regulations

  • Inappropriate release of confidential data

Radicati believes this will cause 20% of IT managers to block employees from using public IM services. Incorporating a corporate IM solution that can be extended to operate in conjunction with secure external IM services is then a possibility, easily addressed and embraced by the user community.


Key Benefits

Companies are benefiting from their IM investment with presence information and reducing the storage requirements on their messaging infrastructure.

Familiar with the telephone tag scenario, or the dreaded voice mail, IM can help reduce costs by enabling users to identify quickly and easily who is in the office, even across continents, and available. Maybe they need to authorise an important business deal and time is of the essence or it could be you require experts on demand, what better way to identify if they are available. IBM, for example, has seen a 4% reduction in phone costs by using an IM alternative.

Messaging systems are used to send information of any size but this is not always seen as the best medium, IM can provide an alternative solution and less the load and storage requirements as well as backup costs on the mail system.

Microsoft have also extended the IM functionality with the Office Communicator application which provides extended presence status and integration with Microsoft Office 2003 and SIP compliant Voice over IP products.

You can see the Top 10 Benefits of Live Communications Server 2005 by clicking on the link.


Policy Considerations

If you deploy IM solutions your first step should be to establish a usage policy. This can include:

  • Use the presence status information features, e.g., busy, away, out to lunch, in situations when you do not wish to be disturbed

  • State to your user base that you will use auditing features inherent within the software to track and monitor IM conversations whenever required to do so. Archive this information regularly

  • Do not use IM as a substitute for email. Use it for group conferencing, announcements or quick questions that need to addressed immediately

  • Prevent users from registering with public IM directories that allow anyone to contact them via IM - users should, instead, maintain contact or buddy lists of people who can see their online status, and state that these lists should be restricted to legitimate business contacts

  • Use and control the distribution and configuration of IM software on your business computers

Adapt this policy to fit your existing usage policies.


Embrionic and IM Assistance

Embrionic can assist you with the design and deployment of Microsoft Live Communications Server and recently helped present at a Microsoft Live Communication Server 2005 Airlift at Microsoft's UK Headquarters.