Zoom Calls Aren’t as Private as You May Think | Consumer Reports

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This year has been a challenging year for everyone, throwing just about everything into disarray and forcing people to change the way they live, work and play. Which is where where Zoom come in. Zoom has become one of the primary video conferencing software tools for conducting remote/virtual meetings.

Privacy concerns

Zoom seems to be the video conferencing tool that can do it all. Yet, Zoom does collect and share copious amounts of personal information and data about its users and doesn’t provide a lot of detail about how it’s used for advertising, marketing, or other business purposes, according to Consumer Reports. Users of video conferencing services such as Zoom and Ring Central should think about data-privacy concerns similar to other online platforms such as Facebook or Google.

Most people on Zoom calls don’t realize how much information the company and a host can gather. Depending on what tier of service—from a free option to advanced levels for big companies—a host can make a recording of the conference, have it transcribed automatically, and share the information later with people who aren’t in the meeting.

the free and low-cost versions are also being used by individuals for everything from therapy sessions to video lessons with guitar legends to informal gatherings.

Look at the privacy issues from two perspectives. The first thing to understand is what information Zoom itself can collect, and what it can do with the information. Then there’s the information that the meeting host gets and how it can be shared.

Individuals can take some measures to safeguard their privacy by changing the way they use the service. But Consumer Reports’ advocates say that Zoom should also improve the platform’s privacy practices.

Zoom’s privacy policy is similar to many digital platforms’, claiming the right to collect and store personal data, and share it with third parties such as advertisers.

In Zoom’s case, that extends to what the company calls customer content, or “the content contained in cloud recordings, and instant messages, files, whiteboards … shared while using the service.”

Videos aren’t off-limits, according to the document, and neither are transcripts that can be generated automatically, the documents you share on your screen, or the names of everyone on a call.

Your instant messages and videos could be used to target advertising campaigns or develop a facial recognition algorithm, like videos collected by other tech companies “Zoom isn’t necessarily doing anything users would object to” with the data, says Bill Fitzgerald, a Consumer Reports privacy researcher who analyzed the company’s policies. “But their terms of use give them a whole lot of leeway to collect information and share it, both now and in the future.”

Zoom Hosts

Zoom video conferences are started by what the company calls a “host.” Unlike other services you may have used, Zoom provides the host with rights that might not be immediately apparent to other participants.

A Zoom host can be someone you know, like a friend, an employer, a client, a school official, or a relative stranger from a social gathering. “Zoom puts a lot of power in the hands of the meeting hosts,” says Justin Brookman, director of privacy and technology policy at Consumer Reports. The host has more power to record and monitor the call than you might realize if you’re just a participant, especially if he or she has a corporate account. There are a few things you should know when you’re on a call.

When the video is being recorded, a small red button pops up along with the word “recording” in small type. If a host records a conference, the video could be passed around the same way any video makes the rounds on social media. For that reason, Consumer Reports is recommending that Zoom require participants to click on a consent button before recording can begin. Zoom already has this feature available, but it’s off by default.

Zoom provides hosts with a feature that appears quite intrusive. The host can turn on “attention tracking” to monitor whether any participant clicks away from the Zoom window for more than 30 seconds while a screen is being shared.

CR’s and other online privacy experts have some advice for enhancing your privacy while using Zoom.

  • Keep your camera and mic turned off unless you’re actually speaking. If you feel that you need to have the camera turned on, choose a photo as the background for your video.
  • Do not use Facebook to sign in since it is a poor security practice and dramatically increases the amount of personal data Zoom has access to.
  • Keep your Zoom app updated.
  • Prevent intruders and Zoombombing on your calls: Before you set up a public Zoom call, go to Settings and turn Screen Sharing to “Host only,” disable “Join Before Host,” disable “Allow Removed Participants to Rejoin,” and disable “File Transfers.” If practical, you should also protect your conference call with a password.

References:

  1. https://www.consumerreports.org/video-conferencing-services/zoom-teleconferencing-privacy-concerns/
  2. https://protonmail.com/blog/zoom-privacy-issues/
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