Reputational Risks In Your Organization - Part 9
Technology and Cyber Risk
Technology and Cyber Risk
The nonprofit in this story is a household name because of its environmental work. Its website led the viewer through all the various programs and services that it had to offer. It even had a link for individuals to make donations.
The development director and the technology director were shocked to discover that a porn site was soliciting donations for the nonprofit through a link in the porn sites web page. Viewers of the porn site were also directed to the environmental groups site. How did the environmentalists ever find out? The owners of the porn site proudly sent the environmental group a check for the donations that they had collected! The environmentalists' attorney sent the owners of the porn site a cease and desist letter and returned the check. This may be a very unusual example of how technology has the potential for damaging an organization's reputation, but it certainly points out how technology's reach is ever expanding.
Some common problem areas include:
In today's world of web-postings, blogs, Facebook pages and the like, your organization's brand and image can suffer even if the organization has not harmed anyone or has not produced defective products or has not damaged the environment.
Although an organization's reputation can be damaged by cyber risks, the unsupervised use of technology, particularly the internet, in the workplace can create a reputational crisis. For example, the Washington Post reported that the Inspector General found that the National Science Foundation had a severe problem with staff accessing porn on the agency's computers. One staff member claimed to watch porn 331 days of the previous year.
Today's consumers also have web-based opportunities to express their displeasure for a company, nonprofit or university. Sometimes these reports are slanderous. Other times, as in the case of the senior management of Domino's Pizza, they dealt with their reputational crisis by subscribing to a Tweet account for the purpose of combating the negative publicity generated by employees via You Tube.
Your Organization's Website
Your organization's website is the electronic face of your organization. The way in which it is designed, its features which make it user-friendly - or not and the content say important things about your organization. Security is rapidly becoming one of the most significant challenges to websites - any website.
All websites need to have firewalls and encryption software to protect client information and to ensure that transactions online with clients are secure. When a client puts a credit card number on your website, they and you need to feel confident that this sensitive information is properly encrypted and transported to the correct location. You should also consider including recommendations on your website for client safety in online transactions such as using a credit card, rather than a debit card, checking credit card statements to ensure that all the transactions are accurate and, if possible, include a link to your local Better Business Bureau, Chamber of Commerce, or clearinghouse to verify that you are a member in good standing.
Who owns your website?
This question may seem counterintuitive but consider the case of the small nonprofit dance-company. The organization had a volunteer who spent a significant amount of time working on projects. In fact this volunteer seemed to be everywhere at all times. The volunteer offered to design the dance organization's website and his efforts were lauded. One board member, however, found this individual's activities as well as his whole demeanor, suspicious. The board member went to the website www.whois.com and looked up the dance organization's website listing. Guess who owned the dance organization's website? That's right - the volunteer. Judging from his reaction when confronted, he never thought anyone from the board would ever think to check. The board had to request that the web company hosting the website take it down until the matter was settled. The nonprofit had to pay the volunteer a sizeable sum to surrender the rights to the website.
Copyright (c) 2010 Peg Jackson
by: Peg Jackson
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