Best Practices for Virtual Events

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual events have become very popular. Unfortunately, unwarranted meeting attendees hijack calls to mess with or disrupt its participants.

Here are some points to consider to keep your virtual events, hassle-free. • One of the first rules of thumb for virtual events is knowing exactly who is participating and also prevent the attendance of unwanted attendees. In order to do this effectively, there are a few proactive measures you can take that will coincide with planning the event and sharing the details to attendees. One of these is ensuring you manage registrations for the event, which will help you to control who is able to attend the event and will limit risk of hijacked events. • Be sure to only share the online event link once an attendee is registered. Do not create public events and share the web link across social media channels, advertisements, or other publicity channels, as this can often encourage unsolicited and malicious participation. Some platforms allow you to use a password or other authentication requirement for attendees to access the event. • However, avoid using a Personal Meeting ID (PMI) for events open to those outside the organization. A PMI is basically one continuous meeting, so once an attendee has access to your PMI, they can enter any of your future meetings. Be sure to instead use a random meeting ID. • Once your event has begun, lock the event at a specific and clearly-stated time to restrict unwarranted access—just be sure to communicate this time to your registered attendees well in advance! • It’s important to communicate clearly on the best practices with your attendees too. You may find it helpful to send out a reminder email including these safety measures to your participants ahead of the event time. • One important precaution to include is to use a private Wi-Fi network, rather than a public one. Public Wi-Fi networks, which are often sources of free Wi-Fi at shopping malls, hotels or restaurants, often make it easy for hackers to position themselves between you and the access point. • Your meeting host or a designated participant should monitor the active list of attendees to monitor for any unwarranted or unknown attendees that aren’t reflected on your event’s registration list. • Depending on your event, consider disabling features that allow attendees to present their desktops or interrupt without being called upon. This can greatly reduce the ability of an unintentional and unwanted disruption. • Finally – if at all possible – try to limit event participation. Large events can more easily attract malicious participants intent on sabotaging your event and can also be more difficult to monitor for suspicious activity.