If you remember one thing, let it be that nothing your company does online is anonymous, no matter how hard you try to hide.

When word got out in 2006 that AOL had released "massive amounts" of user search data, it served as a reminder to many that nothing one does online is truly anonymous. As the Berkman Center for Internet and Society's Hal Roberts recently noted, businesses need the reminder as much as individuals do.

Since then, search engines like Google have taken measures to "anonymize" user data somewhat by scrambling or truncating IP addresses in search logs. Organizations like the World Privacy Forum offer helpful tips on maintaining privacy online. They include common sense ideas like "Avoid using terms that include your full legal name attached to any information that you don't want associated with it," and not-so-obvious tips like "Don't accept search engine cookies," or "Don't sign up for e-mail with the same engine you regularly use to search."

Some users, however, may require more before they are convinced it's safe to surf the Web. It's for those users that open source projects like Tor and companies like Abraxas-owned Anonymizer have emerged. Both offer a network of virtual tunnels through which a user's Internet traffic is rerouted, making it harder for hackers or others who might intercept that traffic to determine its origin and its destination. (Tor's Web site offers helpful diagrams of the process.) Abraxas CTO Lance Cottrell explained, "We are protecting [customers] from monitoring and identification by outsiders while ensuring that [they] can maintain control over their information and the actions of their employees."

In an e-mail to IT Business Edge, IT security and compliance expert and author James DeLuccia said technology offered by Tor, Anonymizer and others like them is "bleeding edge on concept and application," and it can be helpful to companies in "highly competitive industries." Cottrell acknowledges the observation, noting that many Anonymizer customers use the technology for competitive intelligence purposes.

On the other end of the spectrum, though, sits Michael Miora, the founder and CEO of information assurance company ContingenZ Corporation. Miora told IT Business Edge that most companies don't use anonymizing technology — not because it doesn't work, and not because they don't know it exists, but because its use carries with it a negative assumption that, beyond protecting company information, you have something to hide. "If you want to protect confidential information, the way to do that is to send the information through secure channels," he said. He suggested not using e-mail at all, or opting for "encrypted e-mail, or e-mail that is otherwise protected against intrusive eyes."

There are, of course, those instances when companies aren't doing anything wrong, but they do have very good reasons for hiding something. In those cases, technology like Tor or Anonymizer would be very valuable. The Tor Web site indicates that enterprise users take advantage of the software to maintain accountability in the organization. It allows a company's employees "to feel free to disclose internal malfeasance" without fear of retribution. Similarly, Miora points out that anonymizing tech allows the fraud departments of phone companies or financial organizations to catch criminals without letting them know they're about to be caught. In those limited circumstances, it's ok, he says.

He doesn't agree with DeLuccia and Cottrell that it's helpful for competitive analysis. "Competitive intelligence is a very hazy area, with a very fine and blurry line," Miora says. "If you're anonymizing, you're already setting the stage for going too far. You're saying, 'I want to be able to go beyond the public Web site, and I definitely don't want them to know who I am.'... If you're anonymizing for competitive analysis, then maybe your definition of competitive analysis is a little too close to industrial espionage."