Why Email Monitoring is Hot
By Allan Holmes | Thursday, March 22, 2007 | 12:33 PM
By Allan Holmes | Thursday, March 22, 2007 | 12:33 PM
The CNews network in Canada reported yesterday that Alberta's Agriculture Department is investigating an email apparently sent from a government computer that calls supporters of the Canadian Wheat Board "communists who can't deal with the fact their industry is dying."
News about employees sending emails that are embarrassing or release proprietary information has given rise to a cottage industry selling email monitoring tools, as SC Magazine in Australia points out in an article published last month. However, not sure if the word "communist" would be offensive enough to trip a monitoring tool's sensors to inform the sender that the email does not comply with agency email policy.
Comments
I'll leave it to others more technically savvy to say what words would be offensive enough to trigger the monitoring sensors of an organization's outgoing email. I think the real issue here, as Sandra Vaughan pointed out in her SC magazine article, is that any organization -- commercial or public sector -- needs to have very specific, defined processes for email usage that are clearly understood throughout that enterprise. As Vaughan points out: "A quick click on the 'send' button could create any number of corporate mishaps…" that would result in IT security threats.
Message to organizations: Make sure you fully explain your email security processes to all employees.
Message to employees: Think before you click.
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Allan Holmes, Bob Brewin and Daniel Pulliam on what's happening and what's being discussed in the world of federal information technology.
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