Zoom Video Conferencing

All Middlebury faculty, staff and students with a middlebury.edu or miis.edu account have access to Zoom.

The simplest way to secure your Zoom meeting is to enable a password. This simple yet effective method will prevent users with the meeting ID from joining unless they have access to the Zoom invitation that you sent.

Remove an Unwanted Participant

In the unlikely event that an uninvited “guest” joins your Zoom meeting, you can use the Remove Participant option under the Security button in Zoom to expel them.

Security Guidance for ALL Zoom Meetings

• Use a randomly generated meeting ID and password
• After everyone has joined, lock the meeting

Additional Security Guidance for Sensitive Zoom Meetings

• Use a randomly generated meeting ID and password
• Only allow authenticated users
• After everyone has joined, lock the meeting

In addition to enabling passwords for your Zoom meetings and locking the meeting once everyone has arrived, there are a few other Zoom security features which can be enabled, if desired:

• Turn OFF “Join before host” (prevent participants from joining meeting prior to host)
• Turn ON the “Waiting Room” feature (manually admit attendees into your Zoom meeting by opening your Manage Participants panel and clicking “Admit” or “Admit All” to allow participants to join the meeting as they try to enter your Zoom room)
• Turn ON “Only authenticated users can join meetings” (this requires attendees to be logged into Zoom before joining a meeting. Reminder: all Middlebury faculty, staff, and students have access to Zoom accounts.)

Links to Zoom security options help pages:

• Secure a meeting with encryption for third party endpoints
• Expel a participant or all participants
• Lock a meeting
• Enable/disable a participant or all participants to record and consent
• Only allow individuals with a given email domain to join

Beginning May 26th, all newly scheduled meetings will require a password and a password will be automatically generated for all personal meeting rooms.  In addition, passwords will be required for those joining by phone.  See below for the specific settings which will be enabled in Zoom.  For more information on passwords in Zoom, see Zoom’s documentation.

In addition to these changes, passwords will be required for all Zoom recordings and recorded meetings will require consent by the participants in order for them to participate.

Users who wish to view recordings must sign into Zoom with Middlebury credentials. The host of a meeting can still download a recording and upload to another platform to share externally.

The best way to prevent Zoom bombing for a public event is to host a webinar instead of a meeting.  Webinars prevent the participants from enabling their camera or microphone.  You can even disable the chat in a webinar to to limit conversations between participants.  To request a webinar license, please contact the helpdesk.

ITS also advises against publicly posting a URL for a Zoom meeting or webinar which includes the password.  A good way to avoid this is to email the link directly to participants or to require registration for the webinar.  When requiring registration, the registration URL is be posted instead of a join link.  Once a user fills out the registration form, they’re emailed the join link directly.  This doesn’t prevent a bad actor from registering, but it’s one more steps towards controlling access to the Zoom session.

If you you want to prevent disruption while in a regular meeting, you can disable the ability for participants to un-mute their microphones and prevent screen-sharing from the security tab in Zoom.  You can only see the security tab as the host of the meeting.

You can create a Zoom account for yourself at any time by visiting go/zoom, clicking sign-in, and logging in with you Middlebury credentials. Monterey users will need to use their full @middlebury.edu address.

There are several ways to join a Zoom meeting, but the easiest is to simply click on the meeting URL when using a computer. You can also call in via the telephone or from a standard video conferencing unit. Here’s a video illustrating how to join a Zoom meeting from a computer.

Dial 162.255.36.11##XXXXXXXXX (Where the Xs are your Zoom meeting room number).

Zoom meetings can be scheduled in a number of ways.  Please see this this page on different methods for scheduling Zoom meetings.

The Zoom Outlook Add-In is a popular way to schedule Zoom meetings, which works with both the Outlook Web Application and the desktop client.

Update 4/6/20: Middlebury has re-enabled participant screen sharing by default in Zoom meetings after a number of disruptions.  Individual users can re-enable this feature if they prefer.

________

Due to increasing security concerns of uninvited guests accessing public online meetings, Zoom has turned off the default setting that allows meeting participants to share their screens without needing the host’s permission for all education customers. Though this is off by default now, you can still allow your meeting participants to screen share via one of these three options:

1. Selectively allow individual meeting participants to share their screen when a meeting is in progress. To do this, while you are in the meeting, open the participant list (click “Manage Participants”) and hover your mouse over the name of the person you want to allow to screen share. You should see a “More” button. Click that and select “Make Co-Host” from the dropdown. As a co-host, that individual will have permission to share their screen.
2. Selectively allow all meeting participants to share their screen when a meeting is in progress. To do this, while you are in the meeting, click the arrow next to your “Share Screen” button, and then select “Advanced Sharing Options” from the list that pops up. In the Advanced Sharing Options window, select “All Participants” under “Who can share?”.
3. Universally turn the participant screen share setting back on in your Zoom settings at https://middlebury.zoom.us/. Navigate to Settings > In Meeting (Basic) > Screen Sharing and under “Who can share?” select “All Participants”.

You can use Zoom to view someone else’s computer screen and, if they permit you, assist them by controlling their computer.  This is a very helpful way to resolve issues quickly.  Refer to Using Zoom for Remote Assistance (PDF handout) for detailed instructions.

By default, Middlebury users are given a Pro account, which includes unlimited meetings and meeting minutes and up to 50 users. For full details on what’s included with a Pro account, check Zoom’s site here.

Yes! Every Zoom meeting has a dial-in phone number associated with it. For more information on connecting to Zoom meetings via telephone or video conferencing device, please visit go/zoomaddress

Yes, each user will need to download the Zoom application before they join their first meeting. They can manually install it by visiting Zoom’s download site and downloading the Zoom Client for Meetings, or, most easily, by clicking on the URL to join the Zoom meeting.  The client will automatically download and the user will be prompted to install it.  It only takes a few seconds to download and install.  Here’s a quick video on the process of joining a meeting for the first time.

No, only the meeting host needs a Zoom account.

Yes, if you enable the “Join Before Host” feature, anyone can enter your meeting room without you, the host, being present. They will not be able to record or kick someone else out of the meeting.  This feature is enabled by default.

Yes, hosts have the option to record an MP4 locally to their computer or to record to Zoom’s cloud recording server. Recordings to Zoom’s server will be automatically deleted after 90 days (changed from 30 to 90 days on 3/25/20), so you will need to make sure to download your recordings and offload them elsewhere within the 90-day window. We recommend storing recordings on either Panopto, OneDrive or Google Drive.

Hosts and users have access to chat, recording, screen share, camera & microphone, breakout rooms, participant list, annotation, remote control and more depending on what’s enabled in your meetings. To customize your meeting settings, log in to middpilot.zoom.us with your Middlebury credentials, go to “My Account” and click on the “Meeting Settings” tab. From this page, you have the ability to enable and disable features in meetings where you’re the host.

Middlebury users with a Middlebury Zoom account can accommodate 300 users in a standard meeting.