Topic Proposal: Release of restricted information through blogs/chats

The blog or the chat room are forums in which employees typically feel comfortable addressing their concerns with a specific project, method, or research assignment.  They might feel overly safe in the environment, assuming the privacy precautions of the host are sufficient to keep anything they might say between them and the people they have allowed to view their words.  However, not all hosts have sufficient privacy concerns and if a person knows you work for a specific company and might have information on that company they could possibly hack the account or "befriend" you on the site under false pretenses.  This sense of safety might cause an employee to discuss unpatented processes, information that isn't yet public knowledge or proven in research that could cause the company to lose public value, or even contain personal information of employees...all of which could be released to the public and cause issues for the company.  If a product were leaked they might lose the patent, if a possible side effect is mentioned that might not be proven it could hurt the sales of the product, or if personal information is leaked a person could impersonate the employee and could possibly gain knowledge of company trade secrets.