Internet Security – Human Resource Management Implications
Part Four – Control Of Information On The Internet

This is the fourth installment of a series of articles covering the subject of Internet Security and its implications for Human Resource Management

Risks Of Publishing Information

The Internet is also capable of infringing on a person’s privacy as a publisher of information.

We can see the Internet as a tool for communicating information, just as television, newspapers and other media are.

The difference with the Internet is that the information published is not as well controlled.

With television and newspapers, controls are in place to determine what will be communicated. It is generally not possible for a person to publish information without it being verified in some way.

However, with the Internet, a person can publish and communicate messages to people from all over the world with no requirement to have checks on the information.

Essentially, the Internet allows anyone to say anything, and to say that anything to a lot of people.

This leads to the Internet being capable of being used as a tool to defame others.

A recent court case shows that this does happen, where the case is described as follows:

“A state-court jury awarded $3-million Tuesday to a University of North Dakota physics professor who sued a former student for libel after she accused him in an online article of being a pedophile. The professor (sic) in question, filed his lawsuit after an article titled “Kinky, Torrid Romance by Randy Physics Professor” was published on the Web site Undnews.com” (Bartlett).

This example shows how information on any subject can be widely published on the Internet. The guilty verdict indicates that the law does consider this to be a case of defamation.

The ease of publication on the Internet and the difficulty in controlling it is also evidenced by the fact that the article is now posted on another web site (Bartlett).

This situation is one that may find controls placed on it in the future, controls that act as a safeguard for what can and cannot be published on the Internet as fact.

The guilty verdict in this case also leads the way for other defamation claims to be made and defamation laws to be determined for the Internet.

While this is a case against a person, it is also possible that this same type of defamation could be carried out in regards to an organization, its products or its services. It is feasible that a disgruntled customer could publish damaging reports about the company.

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Drawn from a paper submitted by H.S. of the information section of the Istanbul Property Management Organization.

Part Three Internet Security – Human Resource Management Implications – Internal Security Risks