Online Mediation Safety And Security

Since March 2020, online mediation has established itself as the safest way to mediate cases. In this context, ‘safety’ is a relative term.

Online video-conference technology is certainly safe in terms of preventing exposure to COVID-19. But how safe is it in terms of security, confidentiality, and party self-determination in mediation?

The security of video-conferencing platforms used for online mediation such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and others is evolving and improving.

In our opinion, the level of encryption—a mathematical formula, or algorithm, used to change data into unreadable and readable forms, such as 256-bit or ‘end-to-end’ encryption—is less important than how users safeguard passwords and hyperlinks to online meetings.

Many of the security threats about which we heard months ago, including ‘Zoom bombing,’ were caused by users who forwarded links or passwords to the public on social media or to others who were not careful to safeguard that information.