Web Conferencing Software FAQ

Web conferencing software enables participants to attend meetings over the internet through their computer or mobile phone. Besides the ability to speak with each other, web conferencing software lets attendees see each other face to face by using their device’s camera and share their own screen or presentations. Consequently, it’s a popular type of program for companies to enable their employees to easily handle meetings with each other and with customers. Of course, web conferencing software can also be used for personal situations such as speaking with a relative living far away.

Since it was built with cooperation in mind, web conferencing software provides various features to help teams run web meetings just as they would face to face. Therefore, with a web conferencing platform you can count on tools such as a whiteboard, live chat, polls, screen sharing, and remote control.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of web conferencing?

There are various advantages attached to web conferencing software. The first one that comes to mind is, of course, the ease and cost-friendliness of connecting with people from all over the world. By taking advantage of web conferencing programs, companies are finally able to speak with customers and partners around the globe without incurring steep travel costs.

But there are other cases where web conferencing software comes as a big help. It improves employees’ productivity since they no longer need to spend time booking a room to ensure it’s free when required. Instead, they just need to send a meeting invitation via email and join at the scheduled hour. Moreover, due to the screen sharing and remote control, colleagues can help each other easily without leaving their seats. Of course, this also applies to other situations, such as assisting a customer or teaching a student.

It’s important not to mistake web conferencing software for webinar software or video conferencing, though. Webinar platforms focus on presenting something to a large audience, and providing specific tools for these types of events. Video conferencing focuses on video quality and doesn’t offer features for team collaboration.

Is a web conference a type of video conference, or vice versa? For many, video conferencing and web conferencing are pretty much the same – they both involve remote video calls, after all. But that’s not entirely the case; in fact, they’re quite distinct.

Video conferencing focuses on using live video for distant communication. This was the kind of conferencing most commonly used before technological advancements made web conferencing far more appealing. Video conferencing generally offers great video, but with very few of the extra features you see with web conferencing.

In the early days of web conferencing, online video quality didn’t compare with that of regular video conferencing due to slower connections. This often meant out-of-sync and unreliable calls. However now web conferencing connects people all over the world at high resolutions with ease, and there are a lot of extra advantages to web conferencing too. Unlike video conferencing, web conferencing adds many more features allowing for interaction, including file sharing, screen sharing, camera swapping, and live chats.

Perhaps the biggest difference between the two is the equipment needed. Video conferencing requires specific hardware for hosting a conference. For web conferencing all you need is a compatible device (desktop, tablet, mobile) and a connection to the internet and you’re ready to go.

Everything that requires an internet connection is open to being hacked, and web conferencing software is no different. From hijacking web meetings to breaching recording sessions, there are plenty of ways web criminals can exploit a company.

The good news is that web conferencing software providers do their best to maintain everyone’s safety by introducing various security features. It’s very common for providers to protect connections through the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol. However, SSL only protects data while it’s traveling from your computer to the company’s servers. That’s why some web conferencing platforms go a step further by applying AES – an algorithm that encrypts the information for data storage. In other words, while SSL protects data from being eavesdropped on while it’s in transit, AES secures information at the provider’s servers, ensuring no one is able to access it – not even the web conferencing provider.

For organizations that need to be Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) compliant, using web conferencing software that applies AES is required since this is the only way to ensure that information stays confidential and away from malicious eyes at all times. And for companies that do business with European costumers and therefore need to be GDPR compliant, there are several options on the market to help with this too.

While it’s not necessary to run web meetings with end-to-end encryption, companies have to ensure that the customer has all the information regarding how you handle their private data. To achieve this, web conferencing platforms have implemented measures that enable administrators to tweak a meeting’s privacy settings. One of the many examples is having a message pop-up asking for permission from all participants when someone hits the recording button. Only if they all accept will the meeting be recorded.

Besides all of this, there are a few in-meeting features to ensure participant security. The ability to lock meetings after they’ve started is one example. By enabling this option, you’ll stop anyone who’s trying to access the session, leaving any unwelcome visitors at bay. Moreover, all meetings can – and should – be password protected to ensure that an unintended guest coming across the meeting link can’t just click on it and join the session.

If you still don’t feel entirely secure, there are other pieces of software that you can use for extra protection. VPNs, for example, ensure that your connection is encrypted end to end no matter what. Another essential piece of software to have if you’re attending a hosted meeting is an antivirus or an internet suite. Using these, if anyone on the call even unknowingly shares an infected document, your device will be protected.

As its name implies, web conferencing software enables participants to attend meetings over the internet. This type of software usually allows users to join meetings through three different platforms: desktop programs, mobile apps, or online – though all of them more or less share the same interface and features.

Usually, web conferencing platforms have a dedicated space on the software window’s left side to display participants’ cameras or the information being presented. On the right, there’s generally a menu where you can find the live chat, polls, and other interactive features the provider may offer. Of course, depending on whether you’re the host or one of the participants, the user experience is slightly different. As a host, you can give permission or accept requests for participants to share their audio and video, lock meetings so no newcomers can join during the session, share your screen or presentation, or scribble on a virtual whiteboard. Another gap between hosts and participants is that the latter don’t need to install any software on their devices, as most web conferencing software providers offer the option for attendees to join the meeting via browser.

Web conferencing software is extremely popular mainly because it’s straightforward to use and set up. Participants just need a device with audio/video capabilities and an internet connection, and they’re ready to go. So unlike video conferencing, there isn’t a need to invest in fancy cameras or microphones; the ones built into the computer or mobile phone are more than enough.

Web conferencing software vs video conferencing

It’s important to understand the difference between web conferencing and video conferencing software. Although both are used to communicate in real time over the internet, they’re built quite differently and offer distinct features. While video conferencing focuses on video and audio quality, it lacks the collaborative features found in web conferencing software. Furthermore, with video conferencing it’s necessary to invest in dedicated equipment, while with web conferencing software a computer or mobile phone is sufficient.