Imagine that in non-pandemic times, you invited over a few friends to watch a movie. You really want to be a good host, so you have chosen the movie carefully to fit all of your preferences and interests. You've turned on captions so everyone can access the plot in an accessible way. You've gathered everyone's favorite snacks and created a whole lot of comfortable seating options in your living room. Sounds great, right? Now, imagine that ten minutes into the movie, a large group of strangers walked into your living room and started yelling and jumping on your couch. 

They would probably make you and your friends feel scared and unsafe. They completely dismantled your thoughtful plans, spilled your snacks, and honestly, none of it feels great. That, my friends, is Zoom bombing. 

What is Zoom Bombing?

In early 2020, as we were collectively adjusting to a new reality within the context of the first stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, a recent phenomenon emerged. It's called "Zoom bombing." If you're not familiar, Zoom bombing is when a person or group of people enter a virtual event on Zoom or another platform to cause disruption, spew threats, or spread hate. This can be in the form of sharing inappropriate or disruptive content in chat, verbally, or via screen share. It has happened everywhere, from virtual religious services to virtual classrooms. 

It happened to us.

In January 2022, nearly two years into the pandemic, we experienced our first (and hopefully last) incident of Zoom bombing during a Cultivators Community event. As Cultivators, we strive to learn from every experience; this is no exception. 

It can happen to anyone.

You are not responsible for Zoom bombers. These individuals and groups are making their own choice, and there is no way to 100% prevent Zoom bombing with complete certainty (other than not using Zoom at all). However, as online event facilitators, we are responsible for creating a container that is as safe and secure as possible.

Here’s what we’re doing about it. 

✔️ What to do in the moment: While a lot of this post will deal with creating a plan before the Zoom bombing occurs, that isn't helpful if it happens to you before your plan is in place. For our incident, we chose to take the following steps:

• Try to remove Zoom bombers manually: By right-clicking on a participant's name, you can opt to remove them from the meeting. This may be helpful if you're facing only one to two individuals. 

• Close and restart the event to prevent further disruption: While far from a perfect solution, this allowed us to cut the Zoom bombers off, minimize the ongoing disruption, and open up a smaller event space of verified members to continue the conversation.

• Record the conversation (with permission!): Because we chose to record the conversation, all of the incredible insights shared on either side of the interruption can be stitched together and revisited afterward.

✔️ Creating an action plan beforehand: This incident shone some light on our pre-event process's weaknesses. 

• Check settings: While we can check our settings once and never look at them again, each event may call for slightly different locations. You can keep attendees from unmuting without permission, turn off screen share capabilities, or even remove the chat option if those things feel best to you. You may need different settings for each event type, which is okay! 

• Create robust facilitator training: Those who facilitate or support an event should be prepared and empowered for whatever happens. By creating a plan of what to do in case of disruption before it happens, facilitators, guests, and supporters can feel more secure in the event itself. 

✔️ Other things to try: The context of the pandemic has forced us to evolve quickly and in real-time collectively. As a result, many virtual event "venue" alternatives exist to offer a safer alternative to Zoom meetings. Some that we will be checking out?

• Youtube Livestream

• Zoom Webinar

What's next for Cultivators Community events? 

We'll be taking many steps to ensure our events are as safe as possible in the future! The big things on our radar: 

• We are shoring up our settings to ensure that events on Zoom are as secure as possible.

• We are not publicly sharing direct links to Zoom events to keep event information private to those genuinely interested in the conversation.

• We are testing more secure platforms to not only expand beyond Zoom, but create a better experience for guest speakers and audience members.

• We are creating and implementing a more robust co-host training initiative to empower facilitators and co-hosts to manage disruptions in real-time. 

• We are continuing to evolve. While this incident was eye-opening, it became an invitation to re-evaluate our events process. We'll be adding live transcription to events this quarter to move us closer to our values and commitments around accessibility.

💡Have you experienced something like this? What did you do? What are we missing? Let us know in the comments!

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