The insecurity of instant messaging is not related to the technology itself but to the system the organisation has in place to deal with safety issues, it has been stated.

Chief executive officer of ProcessOne Mickael Remond said that many companies were used to operating instant messaging systems in order to keep in touch with one another, with it perhaps being a security issue if a third-party network is acting as an underlay.

However, he emphasised that if businesses wanted to talk with partners or co-workers, they must realise that "data is not totally secure and could be listened to by either the third party provider but also by a sniffing of the network when encryption is not used to connect to the server".

Despite this, Mr Remond stated that instant messaging was still useful in the workplace if used in conjunction with a secure gateway, as conversations can be logged.

Microsoft issued some top tips for businesses using instant messaging, with the organisation stressing that confidential information should not be shared via the medium, instead keeping to information about meeting times and the whereabouts of co-workers.

More than half of small businesses (53 per cent) believe that the most important benefit of outsourcing is guaranteed response times for IT support. London-based Connect conducted the research in 2007.