Effectively using the Guest User feature in Parablu’s BluSync™

Effective and efficient online collaboration is indispensable for businesses. A cloud-based workspace that allows secure uploading, sharing, and collaboration of business documents streamlines organization workflow, improves productivity, promotes on-the-go sharing, supports remote working, and makes administration easy.

Online collaboration with external teams may not be safe

But in a modern workplace, online collaboration is not just limited to internal teams but tends to extend to external teams and individuals who lie beyond the corporate security and network perimeter. Within organizations, there are pre-designed security checks at application level, at the network level, and at endpoints. Further, there is a general sense of responsibility and ownership of business data amongst employees. However, this may not be the case when collaborating with external parties or third-party vendors. There is a high chance they could use an unauthorized device for accessing shared data assets or simply be ignorant about secure data protocols while handling sensitive corporate data.

Any gap in data security could mean data loss and trigger a chain of negative business-impacting events.

How to ensure safe online collaboration with external teams

There is an easy way to mitigate possible data protection risks when external collaborators are handling and engaging with sensitive corporate data. One way is to enable safe collaboration features using solutions like BluSync that allow the creation of temporary guest accounts with all access permissions and protection checks in place. BluSync also has a centralized monitoring platform that offers complete visibility on all uploads, shares, and access activities.

How BluSync can ensure safe online collaboration with external teams

BluSync allows administrators to create guest accounts and specify a date of expiration for them. This is useful for short-term collaboration that may be required with external users. Once the specified date is reached, guest accounts automatically expire allowing the license to be reused. The guest user’s access to the data will be automatically blocked.

How to ensure safe online collaboration with external teams

There is an easy way to mitigate possible data protection risks when external collaborators are handling and engaging with sensitive corporate data. One way is to enable safe collaboration features using solutions like BluSync that allow the creation of temporary guest accounts with all access permissions and protection checks in place. BluSync also has a centralized monitoring platform that offers complete visibility on all uploads, shares, and access activities.

How to create a guest user in BluSync?

To create a guest user in BluSync, you may follow the steps below:

1. Login to the Parablu Portal

2. On the Parablu Portal home, go to the Users tab

3. On the Create User page, enter the required details such as:

• Username: Username of the guest user
• Email Address: Email address of the guest user
• Password: A temporary password you’d like to assign the guest user (they will be forced to change this the first time they log in)
• Account Type: Choose ‘User’. This is the only option for a Guest user

4. Under the BluSync Information section, add the following details:

• MiniCloud – The shared folder/mini-clouds that you wish that the guest user should have access to
• BluSync Access – Allows accessing shared folders using web browser
• BluSync Policy Name – You may assign them to an existing policy

5. Next, check the Allow automatic user-aging checkbox

6. Add a value in the Number of days field and select the appropriate options from the following:

You may choose one of these option based on your organization’s preference.

• Number of days of inactivity after which user is automatically blocked 
• Number of days after user ID creation after which user is automatically blocked

7. Once done click on Save

Once these steps are successfully completed, the guest user will get a notification in their email with their login credentials. The user is forced to change their password the first time they login.  Once they log in successfully, they may access their assigned mini-clouds and collaborate. However, based on the specified number of days and conditions under Allow automatic user-aging, the guest user’s access will be automatically blocked when those conditions are met.

There are several other BluSync features that have been thoughtfully designed to ensure data protection and privacy. To learn about such features, reach out to our experts and ask for a demo.