Using 'Anyone with the link' sharing with Google Drive
Google Drive is one of the most powerful services on the web today, and is a tool that we absolutely wouldn't be able to live without.
As a school staff member, you have access to some additional, even more powerful Google Drive functionality that students won't see. As Spider-Man's Uncle Ben always said, "With great power, comes great responsibility," so we've prepared some quick reminders of things to think about before using 'Anyone with the link' sharing with Google Drive.
How do I know what's okay to share using 'Anyone with the link' sharing?
It all boils down to this: use your best judgement and common sense before sharing a file or document using the 'Anyone with the link' setting. If you think that someone would be upset 😠if the entire world (not just the entire school) somehow got access to a file, you should definitely go about sharing it in another way!
Here are a few other best practices to think about before hitting that 'share' button:
- Never use 'Anyone with the link' sharing for content containing a student's (or anyone's) personal information, since anyone who receives the link would also have the ability to share it!
- Determine whether or not there's a better way to share the content, whether that's through Seesaw messaging, to a grade-level email group (like grade2@yourschool.ca), or another means.
- There are daily limits to how many times a file can be viewed. These limits aren't tiny, but using 'Anyone with the link' sharing to send out the school Christmas concert video will hit these limits and be a bad time for everyone involved!
- Giving 'Anyone with the link' editing permission to a Google Doc means that anyone will be able to make edits, and there'll be no way to know who — keep that in mind!
What is 'Anyone with the link' sharing anyways?
Setting sharing permissions on a file or document in Google Drive to 'Anyone with the link' does just that! This grants access to anyone who has the link to the file–whether you sent it to them directly or if it was passed on by someone else. Whoever has access won't even need to sign into a Google account to do so.
This is fantastic for convenience, but also makes it far easier for content you're sharing to make its way to someone who it wasn't intended for.
