
Unfortunately, universities across the country (including UCR) have been experiencing "Zoombombing," or uninvited guests entering a meeting and using Zoom’s screen-sharing feature to broadcast racist and pornographic content. Most Zoom meetings have a public link that, if clicked, allow anyone to join. You can protect your virtual space by enabling some of the following Zoom controls:
Recommended Settings
- Create a unique Meeting ID (this can even be a recurring meeting) instead of using your PMI. There are detailed instructions on creating a recurring meeting on our main Zoom page.
- Set screen sharing to host only: Only you would be able to share your screen. As a host (if you decide mid-meeting) you can still grant individuals the ability to share in the Participant pane.
- Enable Waiting Room: Enable waiting room, but check for Guest Participants Only. This way your students can enter seamlessly and others will be stuck in the waiting room unless allowed in.
- Require Password: you can customize the password (e.g., your course number) to make it easier to remember
- Embed Password in link for one-lick join: Turning this on will create a more complex URL without having to give out a separate password to your students.
- Mute Participants Upon Entry
During a meeting
- Designate a co-host: you can make a TA or rotate students to be a co-host and train them on what to do to help you immediately shut down unwanted activity.
- Mute all: as the host, you can choose to mute all upon entry. You can mute all during the meeting in the Participant window. You can also stop participants from unmuting themselves, and instead ask them to use chat for questions.
- Stop the participants video: Before the meeting, you can choose to have participant video off upon entry. You can also stop participant video in the Participant window.
- Remove: from that Participants window, you can mouse over a participant’s name, and several options will appear, including Remove. Your UCR Zoom settings are by default set to bar removed participants from returning.
- NOTE: The new Security button on the toolbar has easier access to Enable Waiting Room, Lock Meeting, and controls to particpants' chat, rename, and screen share.
Recording a meeting
- Always inform participants that they are being recorded.
- Record active speaker with shared screen, not Gallery view. See Recording Layouts for details.
- Spotlight video to lock the active speaker to the presenter and uncheck ‘Display participants’ names in the recording.
If you suspect a UCR student of disrupting your Zoom meeting, please report the social misconduct to the Student Conduct and Academic Integrity Programs Office.