Congregation Sharing Help

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New World Scheduler Congregation Sharing is a feature that automatically shares and synchronizes data between approved brothers, allowing all appointed brothers to quickly and easily keep up-to-date with what is happening in the congregation.

Congregation Sharing does not store sensitive or confidential information online, therefore is fully compliant with sfl.

To access Congregation Sharing, click Congregation > Congregation Sharing

New World Scheduler Congregation Congregation Sharing menu

Connect to your Congregation

Enable and Setup Congregation Sharing

Common Sharing Questions & Problems

Congregation Administrators

Congregation Sharing Logs

Disable Congregation Sharing

Connect to your Congregation

If Congregation Sharing has already been enabled and setup by another Elder in your congregation, please see Open a Congregation from Sharing

If you have enabled Congregation Sharing on one computer and want to connect on another computer, please see Open a Congregation from Sharing

Otherwise, please see Setup Congregation Sharing

Enable and Setup Congregation Sharing

  • Note: Only ONE elder should Create and Share the congregation. All other appointed brothers should Open this congregation from Sharing. If multiple elders have separately created congregations, you cannot merge them.
  • Note: Please only Enable Congregation Sharing after you have finished Importing or entering all your data.
  • Note: Congregation Sharing can also be used to share data between two of your own computers.

Enable Congregation Sharing

  1. Click Persons > Add Person and add yourself to New World Scheduler. Ensure you are set as an Elder and your Email 1 field matches the Email Address you setup when you first opened New World Scheduler.
    • Note: See Persons Help for more information.
    • Note: If necessary, click Settings to adjust your email address. Please only use lowercase for all email addresses.
  2. Click Congregation > Congregation Sharing
  3. Carefully read all the information, so you fully understand how Congregation Sharing works. Tick to confirm you understand.
  4. Select your Sharing Region
    • Note: This determines which New World Scheduler Sharing Server you will use. Please remember your selection.
  5. Click Enable Congregation Sharing
  6. Check all the information is correct and click Yes
New World Scheduler Congregation Sharing Enable Congregation Sharing

Create a Congregation Sharing Password

  1. Create a Congregation Sharing Password
    • Note: The password must be given to other brothers in your congregation so they can connect.
    • Note: The password must be 12 characters or longer, and include lowercase, uppercase and numbers.
    • Note: As this password is used to encrypt your data, we recommend choosing a secure password. The best passwords are long phrases easy to remember, e.g. Congregation@NewYork2023 or PublicWitnessingIsGreat!543 or DeathWillBeNoMore21:34
  2. Ensure your Email is correct and exactly matches your Person Email 1 record.
  3. Click Create
  4. Identify yourself. Select yourself from the list of persons
      • Note: The person’s Email 1 must exactly match your Email. This is for security purposes. If they do not exactly match, please either change your Email or change the person’s Email 1.
New World Scheduler Congregation Sharing Create Congregation Sharing Password 1

Verify your computer

  1. A Verification Code will be automatically sent to your Email.
  2. Check your email to find your Verification Code.
    • Note: This should arrive within 60 seconds. Sometimes it may be in your SPAM or JUNK folders, so please also check there.
  3. Enter the Verification Code
  4. Click Verify
  5. Your Congregation has now been shared!

Verification problems

If you have problems verifying your email, please try the following:

  1. Check your SPAM or JUNK folders
  2. Double-check your Email address is exactly correct
  3. Click Resend Verification Code
  4. Create a new email account that will accept emails. We recommend Gmail.
    • Note: Some email domains will not accept email verifications due to MailPolicy violations. Hotmail or Outlook also tends to block a lot of emails. There is nothing we can do about this. We do not control the policies of other email providers.  Either contact your email provider and ask them why they are blocking our emails, or just use Gmail.
  5. Wait 24 hours and try again. Sometimes email servers go down temporarily.
  6. Please do not contact us unless you have tried all of the above.

Congregation Administrators

Any Shared Person who has Congregation Administration – Edit User Access is a Congregation Administrator. In the Shared Persons list, they will have a small user-gear icon next to their name.

Congregation Administrators are responsible for:

  1. Add or Removing Shared Persons. See Add Persons to Congregation Sharing
  2. Setting User Access for Shared Persons. See Congregation Sharing User Access
  3. Creating or Changing the Congregation Sharing Password. Click Change Password.
    • Note: Please remember to tell the other elders the new password!

We strongly recommend having at least 2 Congregation Administrators. This would usually be at least the COBE and Secretary, but may include others.

New World Scheduler Congregation Sharing view

Add Persons to Congregation Sharing

  1. Ensure the person has already been added as a Person in New World Scheduler
  2. Double check their Person Information > Email 1 is accurate and correct, and they know which email has been recorded
  3. Click Congregation > Congregation Sharing
  4. Click Add Person
  5. Find and select the person, click OK
  6. Set their User Access
  7. Click Send Invitation Email, or tell the Shared Person the following:
    • Sharing Region
    • Congregation ID
    • Congregation Sharing Password
  8. The Shared Person should now install New World Scheduler on their computer, and click Open from Congregation Sharing

Two-Factor Authentication (2FA)

For added security, Congregation Sharing uses Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) for all Shared Persons.

This means in additional to knowing the Sharing Region, Congregation ID and Congregation Sharing Password, a persons Email address is also used to Identify them as being allowed to connect to the congregation.

When a person connects to the congregation, they must also use the exact same Email as their person’s Email 1 record, and then Verify their email.

This is very similar to the security of jwpub.org and is an extremely secure system.

Example

New World Scheduler Congregation Sharing Person Email 1

New World Scheduler Congregation Sharing Shared Members Email Matches

New World Scheduler Members Identify Member Email Matches

Congregation Sharing User Access

When Congregation Sharing is enabled, User Access is also automatically enabled and cannot be disabled.

Congregation Administrators should set the User Access for all Shared Persons before they connect.

Please see User Access Help for more information.

Remove Persons from Congregation Sharing

  • Note: Removing a person from Congregation Sharing means they no longer can connect to Congregation Sharing and receive data changes.
  1. Click Congregation > Congregation Sharing
  2. Select the person to remove
  3. Click Remove Person
  4. Optionally, tick Remotely Delete all their New World Scheduler data
      • Note: See Remotely Delete New World Scheduler data below for more details
  5. Confirm your selection

Remotely Delete New World Scheduler data

When removing a person from Congregation Sharing, a Congregation Administrator can optionally choose to Remotely Delete all their New World Scheduler data.

This means the next time that person opens New World Scheduler, he will be disconnected from Congregation Sharing and all his New World Scheduler data, including Automatic Backups, will be automatically deleted.

You should generally only choose this option in extreme circumstances, e.g. a person is deleted as an elder and disagrees with the decision.

Please note the following limitations:

  1. If the person doesn’t open New World Scheduler, their data will not be deleted
  2. If the person opens New World Scheduler when their internet is not connected, their data will not be deleted
  3. Any manual backups stored on USB or elsewhere will not be deleted

If Remotely Delete Data is ticked, the Shared Person who was removed will still be shown in the Shared Persons list, but highlighted in Gray. This indicates there is an active “Remotely Delete Data” command waiting for them when they next connect.

Allow the person to Connect again

To allow the person to connect again, remove them from the Shared Persons list, then re-add them.

Change Sharing Password

For security reasons, we recommend changing the Sharing Password every 1-2 years.

The Sharing Password must be 10 characters or longer. Since this password is used to encrypt your data, we recommend choosing a long, secure password.

The best passwords are long phrases that are easy to remember, e.g. Congregation@NewYork2023 or PublicWitnessingIsGreat!123

  1. Click Congregation > Congregation Sharing
  2. Click Change Password
    • Note: This will affect all other Shared Persons. Please remember to tell all Shared Persons the new password!

Congregation Sharing Logs

All interaction with the sharing server is logged for debugging and security purposes. These logs can be viewed by any brother connected to Congregation Sharing.

  1. Click Congregation > Congregation Sharing > Sharing Logs button

Disable Congregation Sharing

For security reasons, only a Congregation Administrator in your congregation can either Enable or Disable Congregation Sharing.

New World Scheduler Support cannot Enable or Disable your Congregation Sharing.

  1. Click Congregation > Congregation Sharing
  2. Click Disable Sharing
    • Note: This will affect all other Shared Persons, and will immediately and permanently remove all encrypted data and logs from the Sharing Server.

Additional Help

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