The new enhancements were added as the result of feedback from FaceTime's financial services customers regarding additional features they needed, a FaceTime spokesperson said.

Regulations from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) mandate that instant messages be treated like any other electronic messages in terms of how they must be retained, supervised and reviewed by brokerage firms (SEC Rule 17a-4; NASD 3010).

FaceTime IM Auditor 2.0 now lets financial securities firms and other companies capture, record, and report conversations on multiple IM networks, both private and public, in use within the enterprise.

Already, financial firms like Thomas Weisel Partners and Banc of America Securities are using IM Auditor 2.0, officials said.

Other features of IM Auditor 2.0, like on-line identity management, IM screen-name mapping, and employee ID directories, enable financial services organizations to authorize employees to continue using the popular public instant messaging networks from AOL, Microsoft and Yahoo! for time-sensitive communications, while ensuring administrative controls are in place to comply with government regulations.

In addition to security, IM Auditor 2.0 provides the following new capabilities independent of IM network used:

• More sophisticated control over which employees can and cannot use IM
• Grouping of employees for more efficient monitoring and reporting by compliance personnel
• Ability to specify restricted keywords and phrases by groups

IM Auditor 2.0 now extends beyond compliance needs to include enhancements that meet the administrative needs of IT professionals who need to gain more granular levels of control and reporting for public IM network usage within the enterprise, FaceTime officials added.

Bob Woods is the managing editor of InstantMessagingPlanet.com.