Safeguarding Online
The Fellowship agreed that Safeguarding is very important for online groups. All members have the right to feel safe, especially online where anonymity can be easily compromised.
Key Safeguarding suggestions would be to:
- Use a waiting room to admit members to the meeting and lock the meeting after it has started
- Have cameras on with a displayed first name when entering a meeting. If cameras are off, the Secretary / Host ought to ask participants to show themselves. If a person is using their phone as a telephone, then the Secretary or host will need to ask the caller to identify themselves
- Make sure that no device is recording the meeting, and persons attend on their own for the sake of everyone’s anonymity. Use headphones if necessary
- Use the Group Conscience to decide on the use of the Chat facility. Some meetings disable this facility, whilst some use it to enable newcomers to ask questions
- Use the Group conscience to decide if logins and passwords should be made known
The latest documents for Safeguarding Policies are available via the links below.
