Important Security and Privacy Factors to Consider When Choosing a Video Conferencing Solution

The COVID-19 pandemic is taking its toll across the globe. The pandemic has also influenced business and socio-economic activities, reshaping various business processes to adopt more contactless practices as a means to curtail the virus’s spread. 

Because of the highly transmissible nature of the disease, the implementation of hybrid and remote technologies have become critical, and various industries are quickly switching in response to COVID-19. As such, IT departments of various organizations are tasked with securing efficient and reliable remote collaboration tools to keep employees connected despite the pandemic. 

However, due to the urgency of the need to implement seamless video conferencing at full scale, many companies fail to adequately evaluate how their respective service providers handle their organization’s data and privacy. Consequently, these companies jeopardize their security and become vulnerable to risks of data and privacy breach. 

Before deciding on an IT or video conferencing solution for your business, it’s essential to critically scrutinize all of your target service provider’s privacy and security terms. This is crucial to ensure the safety of your organization’s data and privacy. Below are some key considerations to note when evaluating how your video conferencing service provider handles your company’s data and privacy. 

Perform In-depth Risk Assessment

It’s important to conduct a risk assessment examination on your respective target service providers before deciding which one to incorporate. This way, you can be better informed concerning the standards of their security protocol and what they do with your company’s data. 

Understanding the security provisions offered by your video conferencing service provider is an effective way to ensure the security of your business’s privacy. Choose a solution that speaks in a clear tone concerning their security terms and protocol—one that is transparent from the start. 

It’s safer to partner with an option that provides rigid and strict security from the onset rather than settle for one that starts lax and then promises more rigid provisions consequently. 

Do your Homework

Every IT solution has its unique fundamentals and barebones. Before integrating one, it's vital for your company’s IT department to “do their homework” to understand how that specific IT solution works. 

This would give you an edge and also help you stir clear of regrets in the future. For example, every video conference call creates unique data, including video chat sessions, recorded audio, email address, IP address, metadata, etc. Ultimately, all of this data lands in the hands of your service provider. However, regulations and laws like HIPAA, GDPR, CCPA, etc., control how such information should be protected. 

By doing your homework, you will be better informed regarding relevant laws and regulations and the boundaries of your service provider, as well as what information they should have and the extent of their responsibilities. 

Furthermore, as earlier stated, different companies have their unique terms. By researching profoundly, you will better understand how your service provider treats your metadata and call information. 

Critically review their data policy for a more precise understanding and ensure that none of your data or information is sold to a third party. Upon request, your service provider should be able to provide you with information concerning how long your data is retained and under what regulatory standards they handle your data.

Find Out Where Your Data is Stored

By incorporating a full-scale video collaboration solution, your service provider will have access to a lot of your company’s essential data—but that also means that they’ll need to store it somewhere. 

Not only that, for it to get to their storage location, it must pass through a medium (or various mediums). Upon request, your service provider should be able to tell you where they store your data and how it gets there. 

Depending on your organization’s privacy needs (if they want such data to remain strictly within selected geographies or entirely hosted internally, etc.), you must consider choosing a service provider that can give you as much control over your company’s data during transit and at rest.