A friend sent a Zoom password secured meeting invite to me as test for him arranging other meetings. After sorting out sound and vision, it went pretty well. Noticeable lag, especially initially when on the mobile to him at the same time getting it working. I didn’t login - just joined a meeting without an account - on the iPad zoom app.
We only used the video/audio. It wasn’t apparent whether any chat is retained.
Ensure that Require a password for instant meetings is turned on in the user settings
Don’t announce meetings on social media or other public outlets.
Carefully inspect the list of participants periodically, whenever possible. This can be done by the organizer or trusted participants.
Carefully control screen sharing.
Disable the Join Before Host setting so that organizers can control the meeting from its very start.
Use the Waiting Room option to admit participants. This will prevent admittance of trolls should they have slipped through the two cardinal defenses.
Lock a meeting, when possible, once it’s underway.
Be aware of everything that’s within view of your camera.
Zoom users should consider using a browser to connect to meetings rather than the dedicated Zoom app. Zoom makes the Web option difficult to find after clicking on the Join a Meeting link. In my testing on a Windows 10 machine, the option appeared only after I uninstalled the Zoom client. Even then, Zoom pushed an installation file after I tried to join a meeting.
I was able to use the browser only after refusing the download and choosing Join from your browser.
I dislike that a discrete conferencing tool may contain chat which is then lost or compartmentalised to that tool. My preference is to use where possible your everyday chat application. That’s the problem - friends and colleagues use a dozen different chat apps. Most people have two or more. Not one app covers 50% of friends and they are all resistant to installing something else. So it is very difficult to work out what to use.
It is supposed to be very easy. The company behind Zoom has also been misleading users saying the platform has end to end encryption. …which in fact is currently a falacy…
This means any communitions or data on the platform is insecure and can be monitored by others. Maybe the ACCC should investigate and take action to protect its users.
It is a heavily promoted/advertised app with major security and privacy flaws…it possibly should be avoided unless one is comfortable that and info/data on the platform can be made public by others or one is not concerned with being targeted with inappropriate content when using it.
Due to significant security and privavy flaws with the Zoom platform, there are many businesses, educational institutions and government agencies in the US which have now either banned its use, or are strongly discouraging its use…
I’d very much welcome a survey of online conferencing tools. I wouldn’t include Facetime for its limitation to Apple people would make it quite impractical for my purposes - my conferences are with people all around the world. The tool also needs to include the ability to record a conference and save it for future use with people unable to join the conference at the time it took place.
I suspect that even if the used app doesn’t record voice, there are other apps which can record voice potentially independently of the app…then the saved voice/sound file can be uploaded to the conference app.
This article talks about voice/call recorders. It doesn’t state uf they work with messaging/chat/conferencing apps…but it wouod be easy enough to test oneself…
Then it may be possible to have the app with the level of security and privacy required for conferences, and then use a secondary recorder to add the record function…rather than compromising onebor the other.
Thanks, and yes, but I’m involved in the organisation of monthly conferences on issues which attract an audience in many different countries. What I want to know is whether there is a recommended online conference program we might use which records the event as a video and audio file we can then provide to other people not able to be at the conference itself. This is an unavoidable thing for timezone reasons. As this thread was entitled “online conferencing - request a test” that’s all I’m asking for now.
In general, if you have not considered what might be important to participants. You might also like to consider the privacy issues, distribution and reuse by third parties.
If maintaining security of the conference call during the session is important, is not the ability to secure any subsequent reuse also important?
In looking at different products, the ability of each product to provide for secure distribution, append conditions on reuse, IP qualifications and fingerprint the content may also be important.
Note:
There may be complex legal considerations.
Is the conference a public or private event?
Does participation cross Australian state boarders or international jurisdictions?
Is any of the material being presented IP or subject to copyright?
Are all participants aware and accept the conference is being recorded and may be distributed (privately/closed group, or public).
Singapore teachers told to stop using Zoom after students exposed to obscene images
Singapore’s education ministry has told its teachers to stop using videoconferencing app Zoom after a number of “very serious incidents”.
In one incident, strange men joined a virtual geography class with teenage girls and displayed obscene images on screens. They also made lewd comments during the class, according to local media reports.
“These are very serious incidents. MOE [Ministry of Education] is currently investigating … breaches and will lodge a police report if warranted,” said Aaron Loh of the ministry’s educational technology division, without detailing the incidents.
“As a precautionary measure, our teachers will suspend their use of Zoom until these security issues are ironed out.”
Zoom has been plagued with safety and privacy concerns about its conferencing app, which has seen a huge surge in usage as offices and schools around the world shut to try curb coronavirus infections.
A practice known as “Zoombombing” has emerged where uninvited guests are either passed the URL link to a Zoom room or guess the ID number and join. Until recently, Zoom’s virtual rooms were not password-protected by default, instead secured by an ID number.
I researched video-conferencing software a couple of weeks ago for myself and my community and I looked at the most popular/well-known options. This is my summary:
If I had my druthers I would choose Cisco, but a few of the people I conference with already had Zoom and wanted to go with that. So I have to live with its limitations (e.g. short meetings or sharing a subscription).
YMMV
"During a meeting you can: A - Open recent chats. B - View participants currently in the call. C - Share the Meet Now link. D - Start recording the call. E - Mute or unmute the microphone. F - Turn video on or off. G - End the call. H - Open the conversation. I - Share the screen. J - Send a reaction to the call. K - View More options.
Can I still access the Meet Now chat after the meeting?
The Meet Now link is accessible anytime you need it. We will hold your call recordings for up to 30 days and media shared in the chat even longer. Meet Now in Skype is perfect for your conference calls, webinars or work interviews."
&
" How do I join a call with my Meet Now invitation?
Our unique Meet Now link will open your installed Skype app on any device. Even if you’re not signed in, you can join the call or chat as a guest. If you don’t have Skype installed on your desktop, we will open our Skype for Web client for your convenience. If you’d like, you can install Skype on your device as well."
Telegram can do Groups which seem to be private by default, requiring an invitation from the originator of the group. They can be made public, too. I guess the problem (or perhaps its not a problem) with Telegram, and Signal, too, is that your mobile number is required to register with the service. Some might find that too insecure.
Telegram groups can have up to 200,000 members each and are extremely powerful communication tools. Here are a few key features that make them stand out in the messaging world: Unified history
Edit your messages after posting, delete them so that they disappear for everyone. Cross-platform availability
Access your messages anytime, from any number of your mobile or desktop devices. Instant search
Find the message you’re looking for, even among millions. Filter by sender to make searching easier. Replies, mentions, hashtags
Easily trace a conversation and keep communication efficient, no matter the group size. Smart notifications
Mute the group to get notifications only when people mention you or reply to your messages. Pinned messages
You can pin any message to be displayed at the top of the chat screen. All members will get a notification — even if they muted ordinary messages from your group. Moderation tools
Appoint administrators that can mass-delete messages, control membership, and pin important messages. Define their admin privileges with granular precision. Group permissions
Set default permissions to restrict all members from posting specific kinds of content. Or even restrict members from sending messages altogether – and let the admins chat amongst themselves while everybody else is watching. File sharing
Send and receive files of any type, up to 1,5 GB in size each, access them instantly on your other devices. Public groups
Get a short link for your group and make it public, like t.me/publictestgroup. This way, anybody can view the group’s entire chat history and join to post messages. Customization via bots
Create custom tools for any specific needs using our Bot API and Inline Bots.
