Organisations risk losing their competitive edge if they fail to engage with Web 2.0 technologies, as Web 2.0 is a business reality. However, if they adopt Web 2.0 technologies without thinking through their risks, firms face making critical mistakes around privacy, information security and possible legal action. Independent compliance expert IT Governance, in response, has just published the 'IT Governance Best Practice Report, the first comprehensive look at both the opportunities and threats which Web 2.0 presents to the business world, Web 2.0: Trends, Benefits & Risks'.

With examples like YouTube, Facebook and photo-sharing site Flickr being among the best known, Web 2.0, or social networking, is a catch-all term for making websites as interactive as possible. By encouraging employee blogs, customer forums, greater use of multi-media content and images, and self-created 'encyclopaedias' (or 'wikis'), all manner of companies are starting to adopt the same kind of approaches. Firms that care about their business and which are not using these strategies to engage with the audiences, from customer to partner to supplier to staff member, risk jeopardising those relationships and wasting the technology's competitive potential.

Companies, before rushing into Web 2.0, they need to consider how empowering their employees, or inviting more and more outside comment on their sites, could lead them to litigation or other privacy and data protection problem areas.

Starting from a workable description of what Web 2.0 actually means in the business environment, this 113-page Best Practice Report structures what managers really need to know about Web 2.0 and social networking. With examples taken from real-life case studies, it then goes on to offer an in-depth glossary of Web 2.0 terms, and a description of the business benefits to be derived from Web 2.0 technologies.

The message is that, while safeguarding themselves against the dangers - risks such as breach of privacy, financial costs (lower productivity, increased drag on the corporate bandwidth) and security and regulatory compliance, the smarter organisations will adopt and adapt Web 2.0 technologies. Doing this will enable them to offer staff and customers the more information-rich and agile way of working and operating - at less risk.