Safeguard Virtual Meeting Privacy to Prevent Attendee Overlaps and Eavesdropping
The Problem
Virtual meetings are literally saving jobs right now, so it’s understandable why adoption rates are soaring. Back in March, many companies found themselves requiring a new online meeting solution. But with the immediacy of the need, some companies overlooked user best practices that help keep security tight. For instance, have you ever seen anonymous participants on sensitive calls? Often these people were invited and they just chose to login differently, but what if the person who joined wasn’t invited in the first place? And have you ever been finishing up a call as new participants begin joining in–because the access code is the same? These types of interruptions happen from time to time, but they can start causing problems if employees (or external visitors) overhear something the shouldn’t. Departments like HR and Finance can be in precarious situations if the wrong ears happen to be listening, so it’s highly important to safeguard privacy in virtual meetings.
Tips to Help
Tips to protect yourself and your colleagues on virtual meetings:
- First and foremost, follow your organization’s policies for virtual meeting security. Remember that they’re never just arbitrary rules to make your job harder. These are in place for a reason.
- Limit the reuse of access codes. If it’s a recurring meeting, restart it with a new code from time to time since it’s possible the code could’ve been shared out.
- If the topic is sensitive (hello, HR and Finance), then consider a one-time PIN and/or multi-factor authentication.
- Use a waiting room so participants can’t join until the host starts the meeting.
- Make sure the host pauses to ask new anonymous attendees to identify themselves.
- Don’t record the meeting unless it’s necessary. This will also help you manage your recordings later since you’ll have less clutter to sort through.
These tips are written to be platform agnostic, so if they don’t directly apply to the solution you use, try to find the most similar functionality and act accordingly. If you have any questions about your virtual meeting software, just contact us at Help@HDCav.com or 360-930-6991. We’re happy to check on settings and functionality to make sure you get the most out of your tools while maintaining your privacy.