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2004 Survey
on Workplace E-mail and IM Reveals Unmanaged Risks
Had
E-Mail Subpoenaed
NEW YORK, July 13, 2004—One
in five U.S. companies (20%) has had employee e-mail subpoenaed
in the course of a lawsuit or regulatory investigation,
up from 14% in 2003. Another 13% have battled workplace
lawsuits triggered by employee e-mail. Yet, in spite of
the fact that e-mail and instant messages (IM) are a primary
source of evidence—the electronic equivalent of DNA
evidence—many employers remain largely unprepared
to manage e-mail and instant messaging risks. That’s
according to the 2004 Workplace E-mail and Instant Messaging
Survey of 840 companies conducted by American Management
Association (AMA) and The ePolicy Institute.
“Most alarming is the business community’s failure
to retain e-mail and instant messages according to written
retention and deletion policies,” said Nancy Flynn,
author of the best-practices guidebooks Instant Messaging
Rules (AMACOM 2004) and E-Mail Rules (AMACOM
2003) and executive director of The ePolicy Institute. Only
6% of organizations retain and archive IM business records,
and only 35% have an e-mail retention policy in place—just
1% more than in 2003.
According to Flynn, the failure to properly retain e-mail
and IM reflects employers’ failure to educate employees
about e-mail and IM risks, rules and policies. “The
fact that 37% of respondents do not know or are unsure about
the difference between an electronic business record that
must be retained versus an insignificant message that may
be deleted, suggests that employers are dropping the ball
when it comes to effectively managing e-mail and IM use,”
said Flynn. This year, 54% of respondents say their organizations
conduct e-mail policy training, a 6% increase over the 48%
reported in 2003.
According to the survey, 42% of respondents perform a job
function that is governed by government or industry regulations.
Fully 43% of those regulated employees either do not adhere
to regulatory requirements governing e-mail retention, or
are unsure if they are in compliance. “For financial
services firms and others in regulated industries, the failure
to properly retain e-mail and IM can—and regularly
does—lead to six-figure fines, criminal charges, civil
lawsuits and damaging publicity,” said Flynn. “Employers
simply cannot afford to approach e-mail and IM retention
as a hit-or-miss proposition.”
While employers have been slow to put e-mail and IM retention
and deletion policies into place, fully 79% of employers
have implemented a written e-mail policy. On the other hand,
only 20% have adopted a policy governing IM use and content.
More employers monitor employee e-mail than IM. Fully 60%
use software to monitor external (incoming and outgoing)
e-mail, but only 27% monitor internal e-mail conversations
that take place among employees. “Management’s
failure to check internal e-mail is a potentially costly
oversight. Off-the-cuff, casual e-mail conversations among
employees are exactly the type of messages that tend to
trigger lawsuits and arm litigators with damaging evidence,”
Flynn said.
Only 11% of organizations surveyed use
IM gateway/management software to monitor, purge, retain
and otherwise control IM risks and use. With 31% of employees
using IM at the office, and 78% of those users downloading
free IM software from the Internet, organizations are vulnerable
to a growing array of IM-related legal, compliance, productivity
and security threats, Flynn said.
Of those who use IM in the workplace,
the majority (58%) engage in personal IM chats. Survey respondents
report sending and receiving the following types of potentially
damaging IM content: attachments (19%); jokes, gossip, rumors,
or disparaging remarks (16%); confidential information about
the company, a co-worker, or client (9%); sexual, romantic,
or pornographic content (6%). From the standpoint of content
and retention, employers should view IM as a form of turbocharged
e-mail, creating a written business record that should be
monitored and managed.
The 2004 Workplace E-Mail and Instant
Messaging Survey also reveals that 86% of respondents
engaged in some personal correspondence while at work. And
Spam continues to plague organizations, with 12% reporting
that more than half the e-mail they receive at work is unsolicited
electronic junk mail.
Employers are getting tougher about e-mail
policy compliance, with 25% of 2004 respondents having terminated
an employee for violating e-mail policy versus 22% in 2003
and 17% in 2001.
As detailed in Flynn’s new book
Instant Messaging Rules, there is no such thing as
a risk-free e-mail and IM environment. Fortunately, by developing
and implementing a strategic e-mail and IM management program
that combines written policy with education and enforcement,
employers can head off e-mail and IM disasters, address
employee misuse, derail intentional abuse, and limit costly
liabilities.
About AMA
American Management Association is the world’s leading
membership-based management development organization. Since
1923, it has provided valuable and practical action-oriented
learning programs to business professionals at every stage
of their careers. More than 500,000 AMA customers and members
a year learn new skills and behaviors, gain more confidence,
advance their careers and contribute to the success of their
organizations through a wide range of AMA seminars, conferences
and executive forums, as well as through AMA books and publications,
research, and print and online self-study courses.
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