FaceTime Communications, a provider of solutions enabling the safe use of Web 2.0 and Unified Communications (News - Alert) in the enterprise, recently presented “Secure and Compliant Use of Social Media for Government Agencies” at the Government 2.5 Conference. In this document was an outline of challenges government agencies face to secure their computer networks when using social media.

Bill Williams, director of Federal Sales for FaceTime (News - Alert), outlined these challenges in addition to discussing ways these agencies can implement effective policies and procedures to comply with government regulations.

Like a number of corporate entities, government agencies are harnessing social media and public networks such as Twitter and Facebook to reach out to their constituents. Twitter is used by the City of New York, for example, to keep residents up to date on street closures, events and other issues.

Government IT professionals must be able to ensure these public networks are supported securely, without opening them up to the risks of incoming threats like malware or viruses. At the same time, they must also ensure there are no data leaks, while being able to log and archive Web 2.0 content to comply with audit regulations such as FISMA, DIACAP, NARA, HIPAA, and others.

“Government agencies are increasingly using social media sites and public instant messaging systems inside their firewall to conduct government business more effectively,” said Williams. “The goal of government IT organizations shouldn’t be to say ‘no’ to social media web sites and just block access, but rather to implement access in a secure fashion that eliminates threats from viruses and malware, prevents data leaks, and enforces regulatory compliance.”

Williams focused on the recommendations of the CIO Council in relation to social media security, including the deployment of a social media strategy and acceptable use policy, following NIST guidelines, providing records retention to abide by NARA and delivering specialized training to users.

The CIO Council also recommends using technology to inspect, monitor, detect, and block traffic, and reviewing technologies for granular control of web applications, data, and protocols. FaceTime’s Unified Security Gateway (News - Alert) and related products help to fill the gap in security measures for those companies seeking to maximize the opportunities of social media.

'FaceTime's presentation focusing on the security and compliance issues related to social media came at a perfect time within the Government 2.5 conference this week,” said Robert Fine, Founder of Cool Blue LLC which organized the conference.

”We had a number of presentations where questions arose about social media and evidence collection related to court cases. FaceTime's product line also addresses many of these concerns, which are going to be a core part of our SMILE conference in April (Social Media in Law Enforcement). FaceTime's guidance, participation, and presence at that discussion will be critical.'

In other FaceTime news, the company recently announced that Check Point Software (News - Alert) Technologies has acquired its application classification and signature database to add a new level of security for use in Check Point Security Gateways.

Earlier this month, the company also announced enhancements to its support for the Squid proxy server in its secure Web gateway, Unified Security Gateway v 3.1. This helps organizations utilizing Squid proxies to track and administer content added from the corporate network to blogs, wikis, webmail and social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube (News - Alert).