The business value of social networks
The desire to network is as old as humanity. Today, online social networking seems to solve a need that is different from simply using e-mail, chat and blogging tools separately.
Collaboration tools are important for members of a team, especially if they are distributed across many locations. E-mail, with 87% adoption, is the default collaboration tool for most business people.
Are you signed up on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook? If you are not, should you?
LinkedIn is the network for professionals. Your profile is visible to anyone who is interested. People link up, with your permission. Many groups form related to specific topics of interest, which provides very valuable ideas and feedback.
Facebook started out being just for college kids (have you seen the movie?) and now more than 500 million people are signed up; if it was a country, it would be the third largest in the world.
Twitter broadcasts a message (max length 147 characters) to all of your followers. It is like micro-blogging, and the simplicity is the reason for its success.
After I send out eNews, or publish another article or video, I simply send out the weblink through one of my social networks to broadcast it to all my followers. If I have a question, or a problem, or would like an introduction to someone, I ask my social network. I always get some good answers. The value is cumulative and long term.
By stressing approachability in social media, top-level managers can stimulate communications with employees. Today, many politicians are on Facebook and Twitter, though I suspect that they tweet through assistants . . .
Perhaps the real reason why so many managers are uncomfortable with social networks is the fear of losing control over employees, who now have tools that enable them to collaborate easily with people both inside and outside the company.
Such individual empowerment is precisely the key value of social networks. Rather than relying on rigid hierarchic structures and formal meetings, social networks encourage employees to work together, innovating by self-organising into communities of interest, and collaborating to tackle complex problems.
Today, many job searches and introductions come through LinkedIn, and that is a good way too to get job references. People have told me that many new ideas come, and many problems are solved through their groups on social networks, both inside and outside the company.
Value creation is shifting from protecting proprietary knowledge, to increasing knowledge through fostering collaboration. This is the real business value of social networks.
Stuxnet – automation systems cyber warfare
Well, by this time the Stuxnet worm has been discussed in all the news media, with little left for me to add. Still, many have asked me to summarise my view from the industrial automation standpoint.
This malware surfaced a few months ago. It can take over industrial supervisory control and data acquisition (scada) systems in power plants, pipelines and factories. It is used for espionage or sabotage, and can cause serious damage. About 15 systems have already been infected globally; several are in Iran.
Stuxnet spreads via infected USB thumb drives (memory-sticks) exploiting a vulnerability in Microsoft’s Windows operating system (now resolved). The worm looks for Siemens’ software which controls industrial equipment like valves and motors.
Most industrial control systems are not connected to the Internet, but do have USB ports. So, this would require an ‘insider’ to physically load the software via the USB. Once the worm infects a system, it quickly sets up communications with remote servers to steal proprietary data or take control of the scada system.
While other cyber attacks have slowed or stopped communications, Stuxnet is the first aimed specifically at physical destruction. It hides, waiting for certain conditions before it changes set-points, alarms and controls.
Stuxnet’s sheer sophistication suggests that it may have been developed by a country, or nation-state, which feels immune to direct retaliation. Experts have not yet determined who developed Stuxnet, except that it was not some lone hacker, or small, isolated group. It is clearly someone with significant technological and financial backing.
The investigations will eventually show who the attackers are (the location of the remote servers), and the hackers clearly do not care – perhaps because they are backed by a government which will shield their identity.
Has the age of automation systems cyber warfare arrived?
Jim Pinto is an industry analyst and commentator, writer, technology futurist and angel investor. His popular e-mail newsletter, JimPinto.com eNews, is widely read (with direct circulation of about 7000 and web-readership of two to three times that number). His areas of interest are technology futures, marketing and business strategies for a fast-changing environment, and industrial automation with a slant towards technology trends.
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