Instant Messenger (IM) protocols are gaining in popularity as an essential way to communicate between two or more individuals in real time. Some companies even rely on IM protocols for critical business applications such as Customer/Technical Support.

The most common IM protocols in use today include AOL Instant Messenger (AIM), Yahoo Instant Messenger, MSN messenger, and ICQ. You configure each IM user as either allowed or denied use of IM applications. For each protocol, a global allow or deny policy configured in config imp2p policy governs unknown IM users. IM User settings are not available in the web-based manager.