As companies grapple with how to provide instant-messaging tools to employees without exposing themselves to security risks, consumer-focused America Online is inching toward making its popular instant-messaging technology business-friendly. AOL reached an agreement Thursday with PresenceWorks Inc. that will let its instant-messaging application be linked to presence technology embedded into Web sites, making it possible for a visitor to tell what other AOL Instant Messenger users are online and logged on to AIM.

While AIM is still consumer-focused and lacks enterprise-caliber security, presence technology could make it a viable choice for companies that don't view IM as a security risk, says Matt Smith, PresenceWorks' founder and CEO. In a business environment, the technology would give employees access to a presence list that would tap into the company directory and serve as a virtual expansion of their limited AIM buddy lists. "We're the plumbing that takes instant messaging out of the IM networks and into whatever directory a company already owns," Smith says.

AOL's instant-messaging application is the most popular in the world, and it also has been one of the central tools that's led to ad hoc adoption of IM in the workplace. Having seen recent college graduates bring their devotion to instant messaging into the workplace, regardless of whether IM is deployed or not, employers are trying to strike a balance between employee desire to use the fast-growing communication medium and a company's need to prevent unnecessary security risks, Aberdeen Group analyst Dana Gardner says.

Even without robust IM security, Gardner agrees that presence technology could elevate AIM from consumer status. "This might be an indication that AOL is developing an appreciation for blending consumer instant messaging with business instant messaging," he says. Cross-pollination of IM and presence technologies is just the tip of the iceberg, Gardner says. He says achieving interoperability of various IM apps and using presence to authenticate buddies would make consumer IM tools much more attractive to business executives.