Secure discussion group for technically challenged?

Shawn

Shawn

En-Route
Joined
May 6, 2013
Messages
4,325
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
Display Name
Display name:
Shawn
Looking for an easy solution to a common problem...

I serve on a Board of Directors for a non profit...this evening a confidential email goes out to the Board from the President and a email reply all discussion chain ensues. One of the board member's inadvertently adds a group to the reply address which broadcast the whole chain to a lot of people that should not have seen the information. Whoops...but sending an email chain to the wrong person happens all too often.

Now on this board we have everyone from very tech dialed folks to those that can barely manage email and text in their smart phones as their tech capability limit all using personal emails across various ISP's

Is there a simple secure group discussion app/program for both laptop and mobile that would allow an email blast to go out to the Board but further discussions could happen within the parameter of that system and not have the potential to be accidentally forwarded like a standard email chain can sitting in someone's' In box?...and I do not need hack proof high tech secure...I just need anti reply to everyone else your contacts not in that group secure but yet is not overly complicated to access.

Any suggestions?
 
Last edited:
We use Atlassian Confluence at our company for collaboration and restricting priceleged info. It's *okay* and could be configured to satisfy your needs but it's not perfect
 
Are you using Microsoft Outlook? If so, you can enable Information Rights Management (IRM) and this will allow selection of the "Do Not Forward" option. This will allow view and reply, but no addition of names not on the original distribution.
 
rtk11 said:
Are you using Microsoft Outlook? If so, you can enable Information Rights Management (IRM) and this will allow selection of the "Do Not Forward" option. This will allow view and reply, but no addition of names not on the original distribution.
Click to expand...

No, everyone is on their personal email accounts across different providers. It is a volunteer organization and while we are set up through Gmail and Google Apps as an organization, any "company" aliases if even used just forward to individual personal email addresses.
 
Use a bulletin board, like PoA.
phpBB is an opensource one.

That is the only way to solve it. As soon as you go direct in email, you lose control.

Tim
 
Tantalum said:
We use Atlassian Confluence at our company for collaboration and restricting priceleged info. It's *okay* and could be configured to satisfy your needs but it's not perfect
Click to expand...

Confluence has been the cause of many frustrations for me at work. I wouldn't place it in the category of "easy solution" for tech-challenged users.
 
RussR said:
Confluence has been the cause of many frustrations for me at work. I wouldn't place it in the category of "easy solution" for tech-challenged users.
Click to expand...

I personally detest the whole software suite, Confluence, JIRA.
I think it is the worst project management software I have ever used.

Tim
 
lol, it's definitely NOT great, but it does give you some ability to set a page and tree level permissions on pages that can be shared via email with people. Even if the email is forwarded the linked pages won't work for people without the appropriate access

What I hate about Attlassian is their hipchat messaging app, we switched to Skype for business and that was a big step up. Don't get me started on Go To Meeting, Skype for business has summarily ended our GTM needs
 
Not within parameters specified, but you could always send out a meeting notice for a telecon.

Telecons are much harder to forward, and you can restrict who's on.
 
Mistake Not... said:
Not within parameters specified, but you could always send out a meeting notice for a telecon.

Telecons are much harder to forward, and you can restrict who's on.
Click to expand...

Don't need virtual meetings where everyone is in attendance at the same time, just an email type discussion chain that is a bit more secure that does not require all the users to be part of the same company ISP provider/email host.
 
Don't quote me on this as I have not done it, but something to check into is Google groups. I believe you can limit the number of members...and possibly use their email addresses for allowing them to participate.
Good luck!
Nothing is idiot proof lol
 
I use phpBB3 for a small private discussion group. As I recall, it took me about 2-3 days to get setup and I host it from a spare computer in my house. The setup instructions were not difficult, but you do need to know a little about networking to set up the DNS, port forwarding and so on. My only cost is about $65/year for the name services.

If your eyes glazed over at that, you can google "hosted BBS" and probably find someplace that will set up the board for you. No idea on costs.
 
tspear said:
I personally detest the whole software suite, Confluence, JIRA.
I think it is the worst project management software I have ever used.

Tim
Click to expand...
What is the best you have used?
 
Shawn said:
No, everyone is on their personal email accounts across different providers. It is a volunteer organization and while we are set up through Gmail and Google Apps as an organization, any "company" aliases if even used just forward to individual personal email addresses.
Click to expand...
The only way to protect that information is to apply additional controls. So long as folks are using separate systems where you can't apply any such controls, the answer is no. The only possible way would be to use encryption (such as PGP) where you control who the email is encrypted to. That still has the problem that the email is decrypted, they could add names, and have their client encrypt it to the unintended parties as well. Additionally, most people won't understand it.

Taking it out of their hands and into a restricted-view Google group would be the best solution using what you have, in all likelihood. You'll have to have them use their org gmail for org related things. If you can't enforce that, you're a bit SOL. Nothing would stop them from breaking out and sending the Google group thread externally, either, unless you do some of the enterprise stuff and route mail via your own mail gateway where you can apply even more controls, though.

Not an easy question to answer :)
 
GeorgeC said:
What is the best you have used?
Click to expand...

There is no one best. It is rather situational.
What is the project? Are the issues or area of focus more technical, or business or sales or.....
Is this maintenance, or new development?
What is the user technical basis? Email support, web based, phone contacts.... What are the requirements?

Tim
 
tspear said:
There is no one best. It is rather situational.
What is the project? Are the issues or area of focus more technical, or business or sales or.....
Is this maintenance, or new development?
What is the user technical basis? Email support, web based, phone contacts.... What are the requirements?

Tim
Click to expand...
And $$$
 
Agreed... even in a restricted group, anyone could copy/paste the text into an email and forward. You can have web pages to restrict copying...but you're getting into some work and/or expense at that point. Not major, but irritating.
 
Skyrys62 said:
Agreed... even in a restricted group, anyone could copy/paste the text into an email and forward. You can have web pages to restrict copying...but you're getting into some work and/or expense at that point. Not major, but irritating.
Click to expand...
Client controls to restrict copying aren't real controls. Unless you own the endpoint and can apply a control, it's just user trust. That being said, it's risk mitigation -- what's the risk worth? You don't pretend that everything is like protecting the secrets of our nuclear arsenal.
 
Skyrys62 said:
Agreed... even in a restricted group, anyone could copy/paste the text into an email and forward. You can have web pages to restrict copying...but you're getting into some work and/or expense at that point. Not major, but irritating.
Click to expand...

True, but based on the OP, I think it is more about accidental mistakes and publishing.

Tim
 
If you are on Office 365, there is Yammer and now Microsoft Teams. This is subsciption based though. You would need Office 365 Business Essentials at a minimum ($5/mo/user).
 
tspear said:
True, but based on the OP, I think it is more about accidental mistakes and publishing.

Tim
Click to expand...

Correct...not worried about intentional breach of information, just looking to see if there was an obvious easy off the shelf discussion application available that removes the conversations from personal email inboxes but allows folks to chime on and make decisions beyond the monthly in person meetings. Gwad knows I have accidentally forwarded my share of email info to the wrong people in the past and some on the Board are hesitant to discuss issues electronically, especially confidential items because of incidents like this.

I sense a market opportunity for a developer...
 
Shawn said:
Correct...not worried about intentional breach of information, just looking to see if there was an obvious easy off the shelf discussion application available that removes the conversations from personal email inboxes but allows folks to chime on and make decisions beyond the monthly in person meetings. Gwad knows I have accidentally forwarded my share of email info to the wrong people in the past and some on the Board are hesitant to discuss issues electronically, especially confidential items because of incidents like this.

I sense a market opportunity for a developer...
Click to expand...

Nah, it is over crowded already. The full monty solution is a hosted BBS with Tapatalk support. Tapatalk will give you mobile app support, email notifications.... The BBS will handle the rest.
Google free or hosted BBS. Make sure they have mobile support (most do) and/or Tapatalk.

Tim
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top