Zoom in a Professional Context

In this new reality, videoconferencing has suddenly become top of everyone's mind. However, the practical and legal implications for lawyers can be complex. Fortunately, there is some guidance. 

Vicky Ringuette is a bilingual lawyer practising family law in Hamilton and Cayuga. Vicky offers services via a video conference tool called Zoom. On April 23, 2020, I attended her lunch coaching session in French called: “How to Use Zoom in a Professional Context” on how to host a secure meeting for lawyers, mediators, arbitrators and other justice stakeholders who host Zoom meetings. The session was very useful. Following security concerns about the use of Zoom platform, Zoom has recently introduced security enhancements to its platform to adapt its tool to meet corporate needs, however, the use of online video conferencing platforms should be used with caution. It is very important to ensure that the conference meetings have end-to-end encryption before proceeding.

There are two main areas of security concern when hosting a virtual meeting: 1) communication, and 2) data sharing or storage. The first deals with the security of the video communication, and the second has to do with the attachments and data exchanged during the meeting. It is important not to share and attach any privileged or confidential documents or information during the meeting in a potential virtual chat.