Smarsh has just released its eighth annual Electronic Communications Compliance Survey Report.
The survey of compliance professionals in the financial services industry shows that organizations are not keeping pace with their retention and supervision efforts — particularly with a growing, younger workforce that relies on expanding, mobile-friendly channels, such as social media and text messaging. As a result, evolving technologies and shifting demographics within the workforce and within firms’ customer bases are forcing organizations to rethink their approach to the adoption and oversight of electronic communications.
Key findings include:
- Mobile and social present pressing challenges for most firms. Mobile device usage will continue to grow in the workplace, which means responsible organizations need to rise to the challenge when it comes to confronting the subsequent retention and oversight challenges. Among respondents that allow SMS/text messaging for business, nearly half (48 percent) lack an archiving/supervision system. While most compliance gaps have decreased from last year, the SMS/text messaging gap is the same as in 2017, and the corporate IM/collaboration platform gap has increased year-to-year from 24 percent to 31 percent.
- Confidence in prohibition is low. Prohibition of specific communication channels for business use is not a reliable risk management strategy and is temporarily effective at best. Confidence levels surrounding the effectiveness of prohibition policies are telling. Among firms that prohibit the use of SMS/text messaging, only 44 percent are mostly or completely confident they could prove that their prohibition efforts are working. Respondents also surfaced significant confidence gaps for LinkedIn Twitter, and Facebook.
Download a copy of the full report below.
