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Securities Traders' Reliance on Public Instant Messengers Drives Demand for FaceTime's New IMAuditor 2.0 for Regulatory Compliance

Thomas Weisel Partners, Banc of America Securities and Other Financial Services Firms Leverage FaceTime's Leadership in Providing the Only IM Network-Independent Solution for Regulatory Compliance

FOSTER CITY, Calif., February 4, 2002 -- FaceTime Communications, the premier provider of network-independent instant messaging (IM) applications for business, today announced the immediate availability of its IMAuditor 2.0 application that features enhanced IT administrative controls to address the regulatory compliance requirements of financial services firms. FaceTime IMAuditor 2.0 is the result of increased demand from financial securities firms for a compliant IM solution that can capture, record, and report conversations on multiple IM networks, both private and public, in use within the enterprise. Successful, rapid implementations of FaceTime's initial IMAuditor with leading securities firms such as Thomas Weisel Partners, Banc of America Securities, and others, demonstrate FaceTime's leadership in providing value-add applications that leverage the widespread adoption and usage of multiple IM networks within the enterprise.

IMAuditor 2.0 features on-line identity management and IM screen name mapping to employee ID directories that 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.

"We are pleased with the results we have seen from FaceTime," said Beth Cannon, Chief Technology Officer of Thomas Weisel Partners. " In just two months time, we have over 400 registered users on the FaceTime server. By the end of the year the company will have over 600 users conducting business with the FaceTime IMAuditor. At Thomas Weisel, we believe in staying ahead of the technology curve and FaceTime's IM solutions allow us to manage and monitor our instant messaging usage and stay in compliance."

"As Instant Messaging for Business becomes prevalent, it is essential for companies to extend the same level of control over IM that exists currently for email," said Rob Batchelder, a Research Director at Gartner. "This includes integrating IM namespaces into enterprise identity and on-line authentication systems and managing buddy names such that they will work over private as well as public IM networks such as AOL, Microsoft and Yahoo!."

The FaceTime IMAuditor enables IT departments to install a back-end software server behind their Internet firewall in order to manage and monitor instant messaging communication across any IM network, private or public.

IMAuditor 2.0 provides the following new capabilities independent of the IM network being used:
  • Identity management, whereby employee buddy and screen names can be mapped to an employee's corporate ID enabling IT and compliance to know who is using what screen name
  • 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

IMAuditor 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.

"Since the release of IMAuditor late last year, we've helped broker-dealers to capture, record, and report on any IM network used inside enterprise walls or for communication outside enterprise boundaries," said Glen Vondrick, President and CEO of FaceTime. "The sales momentum we've generated by signing numerous new customers during the last quarter demonstrates how wide the adoption and usage of IM networks is in business. IMAuditor's unique IM network independence offers financial services firms the ability to satisfy employees' needs to continue using public IM networks while meeting the firms' needs for regulatory compliance."

About FaceTime Communications
Founded in 1998, FaceTime Communications is the leading provider of security solutions for the management and control of greynet applications such as adware/spyware, instant messaging, webmail, P2P file sharing, web conferencing and instant voice. FaceTime delivers the industry's first IMPact Index, which assesses "point-in-time" risks posed by viruses, worms and other malware propagating through greynet applications. FaceTime's award-winning solutions are used by over 600 customers, among them seven of the eight largest U.S. financial institutions. FaceTime supports or has strategic partnerships with all leading public and private IM network providers, including AOL, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, IBM, Bloomberg, Jabber and Reuters.

FaceTime is headquartered in Foster City, California. For more information visit http://www.facetime.com or call 888-349-FACE.

PR Contact:

Emily Chamberlin
650-762-2945
echamberlin@ar-edelman.com


 
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