Teams now allow organizers to lock and unlock meetings

Microsoft Teams has introduced a new option that allows organizers to prevent unwanted people from entering ongoing meetings. The “Lock meeting” feature was noticed on the Microsoft 365 roadmap in April and is now generally available in the Teams desktop app.

Previously, the organizers had an option to manually admit attendees to the meetings, but there was no way to prevent late participants from jumping in. Thanks to this feature, the new granulator controls now allow organizers to lock and unlock meetings at any time and choose when someone enters their virtual space.

The process of locking microsoft teams meetings is pretty simple. To do this, the meeting organizer must go to the Attendees panel, click the three-dot menu icon (…) and then choose the “Lock Meeting” option. Users immediately see an alert at the top of the meeting screen saying that “This meeting is locked. No one else can participate.”

People who try to join the locked meeting in any way (such as from mobile, desktop, internet, PSTN, and devices) will be notified of the locked status via a notification. However, invitees can still access the chat while the meeting is ongoing, and other sources, such as the transcript and recording, will be available once the session ends. This lock remains in place until the organizer manually unlocks or leaves the meeting. The meeting organizer can unlock the meeting again by repeating the same process.

Microsoft has released a number of updates in recent months to make it easier for meeting organizers to manage access. The new lock meetings experience an extra layer of privacy on the Teams collaboration platform. In particular, it can help teachers and team leaders punish people who are consistently late for their virtual meetings.

Source: unmsft