FaceTime Gets The (Instant) Message

FaceTime, a Belmont, Calif.-based security and compliance vendor, provides the Unified Security Gateway -- a Unified Threat Management solution that, among other features, can capture and log all IM chat between clients connected to a network being monitored, or between monitored clients and IM clients outside the network.

Supported IM software includes, MSN, Yahoo!, AOL, Lotus SameTime, Google talk, Reuters Messaging, Meebo and others. Administrators have the option to display a warning message to all chatters that the session is being logged (the message is customizable, in this example the message has been set to state "This IM session is being recorded."

This is a capture of an IM chat between a client on a network being monitored by FaceTime and another MSN client on the internet. The remote client sent a link to a gambling site to the network client via IM. Access to the site was blocked per configuration of FaceTime's content policy.

The chat has been logged and transcript of the entire chat is available under USG's "Reports" option. All IM transcripts are given an ID number for each IM session logged.

Clicking on the ID number opens up the IM transcript.

Various parameters can be set for running transcript reports. Reports can be run by date, IM software or by employee.