Smash hit

Other questions that are often asked have more to do with office harmony and politics than legal risk. A manager who uses Facebook sends one of his team a “friend request”. The choice for the team member is simple: offend his manager by saying no, or say yes and open up his online private life for managerial scrutiny. Office etiquette will evolve to deal with this question. Or what about the video of that manager at the office party posted on YouTube without his consent? Arguments based on the UK’s developing law of informational privacy may be made in favour of the video’s removal, but the issue is a complex one.

Many businesses are allowing Web 2.0 technologies to grow organically in their workplace, bubbling up through the ranks rather than being imposed top-down. They see the risks but are adopting strategies to mitigate them. Other businesses are going further, in some cases much further, actively identifying ways to embed Web 2.0 technologies into their corporate culture, harnessing the potential benefits the new technologies offer to enhance their businesses.

Clearly, a lot of previously static web pages are undergoing an overhaul to enable user generated content and greater user involvement, but many businesses are bringing such features into the workplace, too. One global media giant is extending its intranet to offer its employees not only the online tools of the trade (employee directories, knowledge management tools, appraisal systems and the like) but fully-featured social networking capabilities, creating an informal community of employees around the world, sharing videos and photos – a truly “internal-only” social network.

The interaction of the traditional employment relationship with the almost anything goes nature of some social utilities is being thought through: when is someone an employee; when is someone not. The company and its employees may find themselves wearing two different hats – employer or social utility host, employee or social network member?

What Google can learn from history

Technology moves at a dizzying pace but the law catches up in the end, says Richard Kemp

Skype hindered by lack of consistent regulation

There needs to be a clear legal framework in place if internet telephone operators are to flourish, says Richard Eccles

What are the benefits for businesses? Forging stronger links between people is a powerful justification, both externally between employees and the people externally that they do business with, and internally between employees themselves. There is evidence, largely anecdotal, that making Web 2.0 technologies available internally can lead to a process of continuous team building, galvanising a company’s workforce by highlighting common interests and experiences.

This may involve a company developing its own internal Web 2.0 platform or simply in encouraging its workforce to adopt publicly available platforms. For example, amongst the fastest growing Facebook networks are those within IBM and the BBC. IBM has embraced other Web 2.0 technologies too, including famously holding one of its internal management meetings entirely within the virtual world of SecondLife.

How do the businesses deploying Web 2.0 technologies protect themselves? Through a combination of measures. Essential to doing so is the development and publication internally of a clear detailed policy describing what is and isn’t acceptable use of company assets. Specific paragraphs dealing with employees participation in blogs, wikis and social networking sites should be included. Without clear statements of “good” and “bad” behaviour, disciplining employees for transgressions is more difficult.

Moreover, the other question that arises is how businesses find out that a particular employee has been spending 90 percent of her day on Friends Reunited?

Obviously, some form of communications monitoring is likely to be implemented, either targeted at a particular group of “problem employees” identified by management, or more generally across the entire workforce. Monitoring employees’ access to web sites comes with its own legal issues in terms of data protection, but these can largely be overcome through the publication of a clearly drafted acceptable use policy.

For companies that go a step further and deploy their own internal social networking sites clear rules should be established, mirroring the terms of use of the publicly-available networking sites. Substantially the same issues need to be dealt with – IP licensing, inappropriate conduct, privacy, defamation and expulsion - but the provisions also need to mesh with their employees’ employment terms. A robust notice and takedown process also needs to be implemented, to enable problematic content to be identified and removed quickly.

No doubt there are new challenges with enabling Web 2.0 technology internally. Personal use of company assets is moving from being a necessity – allowing an employee to pay his gas bill online or phone his doctor – to being social and extracurricular. But none of the legal challenges are so significant that they should cause businesses to forgo the internal and external benefits available. As Chris Kelly, Facebook’s general counsel puts it, “Doesn’t everyone get business through friends?”

Mark Watts is a partner at Bristows specialising in information technology and was formerly inhouse counsel at IBM

Explore Law

• Columnists

• Law Panel

• Law Reports

• Student Law

Times Recommends

• BGC 'set aside £40m to lure Tullett brokers'
• Legal aid review to ensure value
• Fears as 21 magistrates' courts face closure