For CIOs and IT teams, the debate over which secure enterprise messaging app to use is typically fought over the level of security on offer. However, for business users, the decision is often less clear, and typically the result of poor understanding. New research has highlighted that many people remain unclear over the level of protection offered by secure, end-to-end-encrypted (E2EE) messaging apps, when compared to basic services such as SMS text messaging (and even phone calls).

The answer is: “Yes, but it depends on the app being used!”. Public sector employees are no different to their private-sector counterparts in that they’re demanding more modern, mobile solutions for collaboration and communication. However, without clear direction from ICT leaders, many are becoming reliant on consumer-grade tools that put data, and digital compliance, at risk.

Any talk of security usually defaults to external threats. But what about threats from inside of your firewall? How often do you consider those? Of course, no one likes to think of their employees as untrustworthy, but the reality is that employees are responsible for 54% of data breaches. And while many of these threats are simply down to negligence (an employee being compromised by a phishing attack, for cexample), a large amount involved malicious intent.

Imagine the scenario. Your most valued client receives an email from you requesting an invoice payment. Being the great client that they are it’s processed promptly! The trouble is, that email wasn’t really from you. It was sent from a cyber attacker who’d gained access to your corporate network and spoofed your identity – tricking your client into making payments into criminal accounts.

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The vulnerabilities allow an attacker to impersonate chat participants – a classic man-in-middle attack. For CIOs this is yet another warning sign that the use of WhatsApp as a messaging app within enterprise environments can put sensitive information, and company reputation, at risk.

Whether it’s a weekly team meeting, or a quarterly board meeting - video conferencing has become one of those ubiquitous technologies that we all take for granted. However, while many enterprises have large-scale deployments of conferencing tools (such as Cisco Webex), many still default to desktop apps like Skype, Slack, or even Whatsapp for real-time, ad-hoc video calls between employees (and even their clients).

The news that Slack has acquired the intellectual property behind Atlassian’s HipChat and Stride chat and messaging services, has left its users wondering, “What next?” All that’s clear is that Atlassian will be discontinuing HipChat and Stride and providing a migration path to Slack for users. When that happens, and what that actually means is unclear. So, if you’re one of those users, and you’re considering your alternatives, what should you be thinking about?

Dixons Carphone has said a huge data breach that took place last year involved 10 million customers, up from its original estimate of 1.2 million. Personal information, names, addresses and email addresses may have been accessed last year.