Digital Transformation and innovation brings major privacy concerns. This is especially true when it comes to employee morale and an individual’s overall experience within a business environment. While the expectation of privacy is somewhat limited in the workplace, most people still cringe at the thought of having a supervisor read their work emails or business-related instant messages.
Intense oversight can create feelings of unease in a business environment . It feels like you’re suspected of wrong-doing when a manager reviews your emails, texts or other work-related communications. This feeling of “big brother” watching over you can be detrimental to employee morale, leading to challenges with employee retention and productivity, amongst other things.
It’s a fine balance when it comes to moderation on a business instant messaging platform. This leaves many companies struggling to achieve the right mix of oversight and respect for an employee’s privacy. The goal is to maintain a professional, productive and inclusive communication channel while simultaneously maintaining a level of privacy for staff. Fortunately, there are technologies such as machine learning that can help you to achieve this goal.
The Challenges of Maintaining Privacy on a Business Messaging Platform
Until relatively recently, moderators were tasked with actively patrolling message boards, group chats and chat threads. The only other method for detecting bad actors and inappropriate behavior was to rely upon reports and flags from users. These methods, while fairly effective, are very time-consuming and labor-intensive. And it took time to identify, report and investigate a situation, which means that problematic and potentially offensive content could be left live on the app platform for hours or even days.
What’s more, the actual investigation process is invasive and it entails potentially violating a user’s sense of privacy because a moderator must go through their messages and other in-app activities to determine if the individual has been involved in wrong-doing or inappropriate activities.
The sense of violation can be exacerbated when no issues are identified as the result of an investigation. In these cases, a user can be left feeling as though their privacy was violated, creating a sense of upset that can be difficult to overcome. In cases where an individual is found to be involved in inappropriate messaging and other in-app activities, the sense of privacy violation can make a bad situation even more challenging.
These privacy-related challenges have spurred the development of new and more innovative solutions for in-app moderation and monitoring. Machine learning — or ML — and artificial intelligence offer a great solution for achieving a high level of privacy on a business messaging platform, whether it’s a mobile app, desktop platform or a combination of both.
Using Machine Learning Technology to Maintain Privacy on a Business Messaging Platform
The reality is that while we have a reduced expectation of privacy on a work-related platform, we still tend to feel uncomfortable when others are reading and reviewing our communications. But this is where machine learning and artificial intelligence technology can go a long way toward preserving a sense of privacy.
An increasing number of companies are integrating these technologies into enterprise business messaging app platforms as part of moderation and keyword monitoring features. AI and machine learning technology are used to evaluate user activities and messages, looking for blacklisted keyword phrases, behavior patterns and other in-app actions that have been associated with abuse, harassment and other inappropriate activities. Once a possible issue is identified, the app can be configured to evaluate the threat level and seriousness of the situation. When certain conditions are met, an automated moderator tool can take immediate actions such as:
- Freezing a user’s account pending a manual review;
- Limiting a user’s ability to send messages and perform other actions on the app platform until a human moderator evaluates the situation;
- Removing a potentially problematic message from others’ view pending moderator review; or
- Sending an alert to a moderator indicating that a review is required.
These are just a few of the actions that can be automatically implemented when a potential problem is identified on a messaging app. A custom business instant messaging app platform can be configured to take any one of a number of automated customized actions. This allows you to accommodate your company’s unique processes and workflows surrounding moderation and communication oversight.
Machine learning and AI technology can preserve privacy by reviewing potentially problematic users, their messages and their in-app activities. This allows you to promptly and accurately identify individuals who are considered bad actors or highly likely to be involved in inappropriate activities. And this is all achieved while simultaneously preserving the privacy of compliant users who may be accidentally flagged or improperly reported by another user. .
Users tend to feel far less violated when a machine learning and AI-powered algorithm evaluates their account versus a human moderator. Plus, AI and machine learning-powered technology can evaluate a user and their activities very objectively and efficiently, without any of the bias that can come into play in the case of a human moderator. This rapid evaluation process can also help to limit any damage that could arise as a direct result of a bad actor and his or her actions.
Business text messaging apps like SayHey Messenger® are equipped with machine learning-powered moderation capabilities, including keyword monitoring. Messages are automatically reviewed by this technology and compared to a list of inappropriate words and phrases. Machine learning technology also allows for a more dynamic approach to keyword monitoring with the platform adapting as it discovers new terms and phrases that may be problematic.
It’s also possible to develop an algorithm that identifies behavior patterns that are indicative of a problematic user. These are just a few of the features that you’ll find on SayHey Messenger®, setting it apart from the consumer-grade apps such as WhatsApp and iMessage. In fact, these third-party platforms lack many of the essential tools and mission-critical capabilities that you’ll find on a well-architected mobile app for business communications. For example, there is no way to moderate on a third-party messaging app like WhatsApp, leaving the door open to inappropriate chats and even communications that may result in regulatory compliance challenges. A lack of moderation capabilities, combined with the usage of third-party apps represents a major risk management concern and threat to a company’s ability to be fully compliant with the set regulations and laws.
Streamlining Communications With a Business Messaging App
SayHey Messenger® is a unique and regulatory-compliant business instant messaging platform that solves many of the challenges that companies face when it comes to communication. The team at 7T developed SayHey Messenger® as a method for patching the holes in your company’s messaging situation.
The SayHey Messenger® app features:
- Data sovereignty for control and ownership of all messaging data;
- Fully compliant instant messaging for regulated businesses;
- Seamlessly integrates into existing company software platforms;
- Admin portal for moderation, auditing, and inclusivity;
- SayHey Spaces for company-wide broadcasts and team collaborations;
- Engaging, intuitive user interface for incredible adoption rates;
- Send compliant SMS messages to external users with full data retention; and
- Custom UI with your logo, colors and branding elements for a style that’s all yours.
SayHey Messenger® offers two deployments: a SayHey Messenger® Business deployment with a mobile app platform (for iOS and Android) and web app portal. There’s also SayHey Messenger® Enterprise deployments, which entail storing all messaging data in the client’s private cloud environment and the platform is fully integrated within the client’s existing software platforms, including mobile applications. This allows users to access their instant messages without leaving the screen, leading to greater productivity, higher user adoption rates and better efficiency.
Consider using SayHey Messenger® as your business messaging platform. And the best part? We can deploy this business messaging solution in a matter of days. Contact us today to learn more about SayHey Messenger®.
