Security might not be the first thing you think about when organising a meeting, at least not back in the office-based workplaces most people used until recently. You could probably take a lot for granted, in terms of who had access to the building, for example, in the co-located physical space. But Terry Lyons, Head of Product for PGi (pictured, above), reflected that you still had to maintain an awareness of securing the environment:
“You’d go into a room, and while you might not actually sweep it for bugs, you’d close the door. You’d be careful with documentation, especially if discussing sensitive material, like personnel records or strategic plans. You’d be sure not to leave things on screen or in the printer…”
Now that the world has had to move every business conversation to the online space at least temporarily, there are analogous considerations to explore there too, before jumping on the nearest app just because everybody else uses it.
Who’s providing your online meeting room and what are their credentials?
“I’d look at the provider you’re dealing with, look at their track record,” Lyons continued
“And I always look at who their top customers are as well. Within PGi we have a lot of banks, who are now taking on additional licences, and legal firms — they prefer to have an office, but now they’re going online and having to dial into conferences, even doctors are using videoconferencing for consultations online.”
There are reasons that highly regulated industries like these are choosing tools like PGi’s GlobalMeet, over the obvious market leaders — reasons which have led to exponential increases in meetings on GlobalMeet from the pre-COVID-19 days. “You need to be careful, and look at the architecture and the technologies your vendors are using,” Lyons explained. “Look to ensure that industry best practices associated with recognised global standards are being used, to ensure the security and integrity of your information. Are they global? What about data storage and encryption? You need to understand what’s going on there and what type of encryption has been used...”
