Whether you use
Facebook to connect with friends and classmates across the country, or if you use Facebook to promote your business, we all know there are many intricate settings and restrictions on Facebook that can either help or harm our personal and professional brands. This is a story of one of those settings that isn’t helping any of us.
Finally after public demand, Facebook allowed users to create custom or “vanity” URLs in 2009. Users were then able to change the current random character URL (i.e. facebook.com/12956t78312qzb) to a custom address (i.e. facebook.com/johnsmith).
In addition to personal pages, any Facebook Fan Page can also get a custom URL.
However, there are restrictions users need to be careful of.
You are only allowed to change your personal URL twice.
- You are allowed to change the random character URL to a custom URL once.
- You are then only allowed to change your custom URL once again.
Fan Pages have even more restrictions on what can be modified.
Once you select a custom URL for your Fan Page you are stuck with it. You can’t change it. The only way to get a different URL is to delete your Fan Page and start all over again.
This restriction is done for security purposes (understandably) to limit hackers/phishers from modifying accounts or creating bogus pages.
However, there is a small subset of users who NEED to change their URLs. I am among that subset. I accidentally superimposed one letter in my URL and now have to live with a misspelled URL (which doesn’t make me look all that intelligent or professional).Although Facebook gave me the disclaimer that once I selected the URL I would be stuck with, I checked it twice and still managed to miss the typo.
I tried to see if there was someone I could call or email about it, and Facebook has NO channel of communication for customer support. You can search forums or speak with other Facebook users, but the company doesn’t really have a helpline to call (1-800-Facebook doesn’t exist – I checked).
I did find a direct line to Facebook online and after “dialing 1” for customer support; I was told “Facebook does not offer phone support at this time.”
What happens to users who represent their personal brands (consultants, actors, musicians) and they change their names? They can’t update the URL if they get married (or divorced for that matter) to reflect their new name?
Also what happens to a business if they merge with another company, incorporate, or completely rebrand? The inability to change their URL is a huge detriment to their brand. The only way to do so is to delete the profile and build a new one – meaning the 4,000+ fans they have garnered will be lost.
Facebook should do one of two things.
1) Have the developers allow for multiple URL changes.
2) Have a customer service representative available to discuss the situation to see if it will allot for a URL modification.
Either way – Facebook needs to relinquish some control so that users can fully customize their pages. Why should we have to deal with invalid URLs that don’t represent us correctly?
Protecting your "Social" Security - Part 2
Survey results from Symantec have shown that half of all social networking at work is conducted for business purposes. Although bosses may cringe to hear that 50% of social networking done in the office is for pleasure, it may come as a surprise that personal social media in the office actually increases productivity (we'll get to that in a second). Although this is good news, many organizations don't have security policies in place to safeguard company activity conducted on social networks.
The Good
A recent article in the Boston Metro reported findings from a study conducted at the University of Melbourne. Researchers found that typical 9 to 5ers who spent about a fifth of their workday using the web for personal browsing were actually more productive than those who were on the web for strictly business purposes.
The article also stated that workers should "batch" their personal activities - recommending a twenty minute session per every two hours of work for optimal productivity.
InformationWeek posted similar findings. A report from Forrester Research (conducted this past January) found that 70% of IT personnel viewed Web 2.0 and social media as having a beneficial impact on their organization's productivity. 78 % believed it helped their organization provide improved customer service. 80% thought social media had a positive impact on their company's innovation.
The Bad
According to the InformationWeek article, many organizations don't have a policy regarding social media usage. Some (about 5%) outright block access to sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace. A policy to this extreme could result in less productivity, decreases in customer service, and create a sour workplace atmosphere.
Instead, companies should provide guidelines for employees and create a way to monitor how social networking is being used during office hours.
The Ugly
Without any policies in place, an organization is susceptible to a number of attacks including clickjacking, worms, spam, and phishing that can enter their internal network via social media websites.
The Bottom Line
If your office is in the Twitterverse, using Facebook, or posting pictures to Flickr, you need to have a set of rules or regulations in place to protect not only your employees' privacy, but your organization's privacy as well.
Senior IT Associate Receives CISSP Certification
Ben. R Howard, a Senior IT Associate at NSK Inc recently took the CISSP Certification Exam and passed, placing him among roughly 64,000 other IT professionals in the world who have the certification.
The CISSP (Certified Information Systems Security Professional) is a highly prestigious certification that requires a massive amount of training and credentials in order to be considered to even take the exam.
CISSP candidates must have at least five years of experience in information security as well as experience with two of ten domains of security before they even apply. They then have to train and prepare for a sixty page exam that lasts for six-hours.
Those who pass receive the certification. A CISSP Certified Associate knows how to formally manage an all encompassing security program. The CISSP credential is a testament to the years of experience, knowledge, and competency of information systems, these personnel have achieved.
Howard hopes to broaden NSK's ability to provide security services to its clients with his new certification. Having a CISSP Certified IT Associate, will only help NSK Inc move forward as a premier consulting firm in Boston.