When Employees Leave: Secure Offboarding with Threema Work

Staff changes are part of every organization. In most cases, there are structured processes in place to ensure that nothing falls through the cracks. With employee departures, it is essential to take communication solutions into account – after all, trade secrets, customer data, and other company information must remain within the company and should not be accessible on the private devices of former employees.

To start with, private and unmanaged messaging apps such as WhatsApp or Signal should generally be avoided for internal business communication: companies have no control over with whom employees are able to share internal documents, and they cannot remove departing employees from group chats to prevent them from reading internal information after leaving.

As an instant messenger tailored to the needs of companies, Threema Work not only offers comprehensive user management but also enables easy offboarding of employees. The goal is to always maintain control over both the data and access to the Threema Work app.

Restrict App Usage

As a first step, administrators should remove the user from the subscription in Threema Work’s management cockpit. If the user still needs access to the app for a while (e.g., during the notice period), you can keep the license assigned but restrict certain permissions.

Once the employee has left the company and has been deleted from the management cockpit, access to the app is blocked and their Threema Work ID is revoked, preventing them from receiving or sending any new messages. This ensures that the former employee no longer receives any internal business information after leaving the company.

If the app was managed using a mobile device management (MDM) system, it can also be deleted from the user’s mobile device via this system. This also deletes all locally stored messages, contacts, and credentials. It’s an effective and important measure to ensure that no company data remains on the departing person’s mobile phone.

Reuse License for a New Person

After deleting the previous Threema Work ID and credentials, the license is free again and can be reassigned. New credentials and a new Threema Work ID can then be created for the new employee. Although IDs are not tied to individuals or job roles, they should not be reused, even if the phone number or device remains the same. This is the only way to ensure a correct chat history and preserve the integrity of the user identity.

By following these steps, companies can manage employee changes securely and with minimal effort, without compromising data protection, compliance, or control.