Security Fear

           Technology has changed our life style rapidly if we compare to our grandparents era. If we have a look on technology changes, the most priceless gift is Internet. It has become the best medium to gain knowledge, entertainment and communication tools to connect with people all around the world. Therefore, we can said that Internet become a part of in human life nowadays. In order to that, the most outstanding advantages in use of Internet are online communication. Internet allows users to communicate with others through Instant Messaging (IM) such as Yahoo Messenger, Facebook, Twitter, Gtalk and many.

           These types of IM especially Yahoo Messenger (YM) is not only used for social and entertainment purposes but also used in business field. According to the IDC report in 2008 by Nortel about “Instant Messaging and Security” stated that the usage of IM such as YM can help to improve the productivity of employee. According to the author, about 74% of businesses identify that YM improve employee’s teamwork but 72% business band its use due to security problems. So, we can make point that even though IM help to improve the employee’s relationships but the organizations more concern about the security problems that occur in IM.

           This report stated about the risks of using IM by employees. The first risk that stated in the report is the attack from viruses, worms and trogen. When the employees use the IM, they may receive an unsolicited email inviting them to the on a link. This link may contain worm and viruses that can damage the computer programs. The second risk is the loss of intellectual property such as the employee’s confidential information about organization can loss when the viruses and worms damage the computer systems. The author also noted that provider of IM services such as YM, Facebook chat, Window Live Messenger failed to offer full protection to their users.

           The third risk is theft of passwords and user identities. He stated that IM accounts of users are also in risk because their passwords and user ID’s stolen by hackers. He also mentioned that many users of YM and Gmail have major attack by the hackers on their IM accounts in February 2009. The fourth risk is the lack of corporate control in IM accounts. The organizations are not able to monitor the business transactions and communications between the employees through the public IM services. Besides that, the author also suggested some ways to overcome the security problems in IM account. The suggestions are the organizations need to take control on employee’s activities in IM, minimize the risk by monitoring the employee’s context and also try to educate the employees whom are the IM users.

          In conclusion, I personally feel that the author has addressed the accurate risks that faced by the IM users and I also agree with his suggestion on how to overcome this security problems. Therefore, I want to say that every problem has a good solution and we need to find out that and should try to solve it. We should not feel fear and do not quit easily because usage of IM services can give more advantages rather than the disadvantages. Last but not least, the providers of IM also should give more important to the security problems in IM accounts and try to minimize the risks by giving more protection to the user’s accounts.