April 14, 2020
Featured / IT Philosophy

Security, Video Conferencing, and Your Team

Written by Zach Sherf

In the recent weeks, businesses in every industry have found themselves needing to rapidly strategize and implement solutions to work remotely. For some, the transition came with little friction, while others were faced with an onslaught of decisions in order to keep business moving. 

Video conferencing has proven to be essential in keeping teams connected while working from home. Many businesses have turned to Zoom, long considered an industry leader in video conferencing. Due to the circumstances that the COVID-19 pandemic has brought on, the decision of what technology to use took a sideline to simply getting a solution in place.

Video Conference

Zoombombing and other security issues.

You may have seen some news about Zoombombing and other issues with the security and privacy of the Zoom platform. Many of these issues have made it into the media and you may be asking, “Is my team at risk?”.

In the past 2 weeks, over 15 security issues of moderate or greater severity have been either discovered or brought back into the spotlight. You can read more about some of these HERE.

What are my options?

Given that video-conferencing has become a necessity, and further that many of your teams are happily using Zoom it’s important to take the utility of the platform into context when discussing options. Really, this boils down to 2 paths:

  • Implement Zoom best practices, put faith in zoom to resolve their security issues.
  • Switch to a different video conferencing solution.

Both options need to be considered, but the important thing is not to feel trapped or rushed into a decision. Interlaced has experience implementing and managing many leading video conferencing solutions. Some of these include; Skype, Google Hangouts (now free for all G-suite tiers), GoToMeeting, BlueJeans and others.

How can I implement Zoom best practices while we are using it?

There are many online resources available as far as optimizing your Zoom security preferences, but as an Interlaced partner, the easiest option is to reach out to us.

If you’d like to tackle some of this yourself, articles from The Verge, TidBits and The ADL are great resources to get started.

Here are some tips we’ve pulled from the above resources:

  1. Put a password on your Zoom meetings.
  2. Disable remote control.
  3. Use a per-meeting ID, not a personal ID.
  4. Disable Join-Before-Host.
  5. Enable “Waiting Room.”

The world of remote work may be new to many, and it presents unique and difficult challenges that require creative solutions. Interlaced is your technology partner throughout and is here to help guide you and your business to success in this evolving business climate.

Zach Sherf

Zach Sherf

Zach is a data privacy evangelist and Apple fanatic. As Director of Cybersecurity, he works with both internal and external teams to drive the dialog around the ever-evolving relationship between people, security, and technology.