29 ms·

Zoom needs to clean up its privacy act

• geoffeg 7y ago
  > As quarantined millions gather virtually on conferencing platforms, the best of those, Zoom, is doing very well. Why would Zoom care about their privacy issues if they're doing so well off? Seems like that's a good amount of positive reinforcement that their current approach is the right one to them. Maybe they'll lose a few thousand customers because of it, but given what I'm sure was a huge increase in the past few weeks, why would it be something they're concerned about?
  • chaps 7y ago
    Because it's the right thing to do.
    • luckylion 7y ago
      Right, but they are a US corporation in California. The "right thing to do" is pretty much at the end of their priorities list.
      • duxup 7y ago
        I don't think geography really changes the incentives.
        • TallGuyShort 7y ago
          It changes the culture. In my experience, Silicon Valley companies have more of a culture of growing at all costs. And they're either fanatical about privacy or they'll sell you out to the highest, middle, and lowest bidders all at once, then give it away free through an unpatched security hole too.
          • quickthrower2 7y ago
            I think assholes that want to make money at any cost are everywhere, in every city in every country in the world. Let’s not be naive. Maybe California gives birth to a higher number of big companies that are also famous and so is more visible.
            • luckylion 7y ago
              They are, but they aren't that concentrated and networked and their attitude isn't that ingrained in the culture. You'll always have assholes, but if you have few non-assholes, it's a culture issue, not an asshole-issue.
              • quickthrower2 7y ago
                Maybe sf is an asshole magnet rather than an asshole breeder. Without sf they’d go somewhere else after all “if I didn’t then someone else would” is the ethical excuse of the asshole.
            • rhizome 7y ago
              Let's not be naive, the VCs are in SV so the assholes flock there. 150 years ago they were named "carpetbaggers."
    • nck4222 7y ago
      I agree, but Zoom is a publicly traded company. Their incentives aren't necessarily aligned with the public good. The question is "why should Zoom leadership care about the recent privacy concerns if the vast majority of their customers don't care?" Their stock is up over 6% today while the market is down 4% (volatility caveats here obviously). So far the privacy concerns don't seem to be impacting the companies short or long term prospects, so I wouldn't expect the company to do the right thing.
      • chaps 7y ago
        Surely, though, there is a way for zoom to do both at the same time. That you and one of your sibling posts gives them some benefit of the doubt (or at least the appearance of it) is... sad.
        • nck4222 7y ago
          I'm not sure where I gave the impression of being ok with what zoom is doing, but I'm not. I'm saying this is the expected course given the incentives we as a society have established for companies. Hoping zoom and other companies prioritize the public good over profits is foolish, and the solution is to align profits with the public good.
          • chaps 7y ago
            It's because your response is the intellectual equivalent of throwing your hands in the air simply because you don't think you can have any contribution towards fixing the problem, and the only course of action forward is to simply describe why things are the way they are. It's complacent, and it's sad. It's a lot like someone complaining about Trump being elected, and you respond with "Yeah, but we live in a Democracy". It's not a very helpful comment, and it doesn't get us anywhere except to keep us in the exact same place we are today.
            • nck4222 7y ago
              >simply describe why things are the way they are. It's complacent, and it's sad. >It's not a very helpful comment I would think understanding the problem would be the first step to solving it. I'm not sitting here pretending I have all the answers. I saw an opportunity to shed some light on the situation so I commented. It seems weird to me that your critical of me for not contributing thoughts related directly to a solution, when you haven't contributed any thoughts about a solution either. To each their own I suppose. But consider me thoroughly uninterested in discussing this further, which, seems to be what you wanted from me anyway.
  • bryanrasmussen 7y ago
    Because the EU is on lockdown, lots of EU citizens now using Zoom, and all of those users are potential liabilities due to GDPR issues.
    • seanhunter 7y ago
      The UK cabinet has been meeting on Zoom during the crisis. It was in a media shot issued by 10 downing st yesterday.
      • panpanna 7y ago
        UK cabinet is about to find out what "zoom bombing" means the hard way...
      • bryanrasmussen 7y ago
        is GDPR still in effect in UK?
        • xiphias2 7y ago
          I think yes, EU laws are in effect until end of the year, to have time to create new regulations.
        • seanhunter 7y ago
          Yes it is, and even after the UK leaves the EU the provisions of GDPR will be part of UK law until some future government enacts law to change that.
      • jeltz 7y ago
        Sounds like even more reason for Zoom to care. The more high profile they get the more like it is for EU privacy watchdogs to go after them.
  • api 7y ago
    The unfortunate wisdom in business is "nobody cares about privacy or security," and in my experience it's true. Outside a small number of people nobody even asks these questions. With our own product ZeroTier we get maybe 1-2 questions a year about privacy and so far only a few enterprise customers have even asked about the security of encryption and authentication. "It's encrypted" is good enough for 99.9% of the market. Encrypted with what? A cereal box cipher? Nobody cares. What do people care about? In my experience its ease of use, ease of use, ease of use, ease of use, and ease of use, in no particular order. An app that's a privacy and security dumpster fire but is very easy to set up and use will win hands down over a better engineered one that requires even one or two more steps to set up.
    • seanhunter 7y ago
      My experience is diametrically opposite to that. All of our clients are large enterprises and the security and privacy features are very closely examined during procurement literally every time. We haven't had a single client conversation that is remotely like what you're describing. Might be because our clients are banks but they really care about this stuff.
      • TrickyRick 7y ago
        Completely agree with this, banks care. They don't always care in the best of ways, usually it's just about ticking a box in a spreadsheet, but at least they ask.
      • api 7y ago
        The few customers we've had that ask are large, so yes. I am speaking of the majority of individuals and small businesses.
      • thoraway1010 7y ago
        Actually - you'll be surprised at the shadow IT going on at places like this. Users will literally BEG anyone who knows how to get around these systems how to do so. It's why your banker might use their cell phone for a zoom client when everyone else is on a computer - their work computer is locked down. Govt employees often the same way. You'll notice they are doing the phone call in or phone client vs their computer. Lot's of companies, zoom included, get in through the user side not the big webex / cisco type sales process.
  • randomsearch 7y ago
    OTOH if you’re making money from your product why trash it yourselves
  • bradly 7y ago
    The reason Zoom is doing so well is part of its vulnerability. There is very little vendor lock-in with virtual conferencing platforms. If something new/better comes out next month, there isn't much a company will give up by switching vendors. There is little to no infrastructure to setup/maintain. This is the same reason Slack's popularity has skyrocketed. Because of the lack of history and transient nature of the content shared in them, these areas are quick to gain popularity, but also quick to be replaced when a better product emerges.
    • kardos 7y ago
      > This is the same reason Slack's popularity has skyrocketed. Because of the lack of history <snip> Slack's business model [1] is storing all history and charging for access for it. Nothing transient about that. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slack_(software)#Business_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slack_(software)#Business_mode...
      • tinalumfoil 7y ago
        Is it common to want to keep all that history? My understanding was it's best practice to delete chats after a certain period to limit the surface area of any potential legal discovery.
        • daxelrod 7y ago
          Ah, but Slack doesn't delete the history either unless you pay them: https://slack.com/help/articles/203457187-Customize-message-and-file-retention-policies https://slack.com/help/articles/203457187-Customize-message-... On the free tier it's still there, on their servers.
        • selectodude 7y ago
          For a lot of industries, deleting internal communication is illegal. For any publicly traded company in the US, all internal communication needs to be archived for five years.
• Tokkemon 7y ago
  Is Zoom the best though? Google Hangouts seems to be just as good.
  • primity 7y ago
    I use both at work, and Hangouts has less features and struggles more noticeably with bad connections. I consider Hangouts worse
  • jacobobryant 7y ago
    For me, zoom consistently has far better A/V quality than hangouts. So we have two anecdotes now I guess.
  • thekyle 7y ago
    I tried Google Hangouts on Firefox on Linux but couldn't get it to work at all. It just errored out before starting the call.
    • primity 7y ago
      Ah yes, in my case it doesn't agree with firefox at all. I have chrome installed pretty much for hangouts only.
      • ThePowerOfFuet 7y ago
        They just (like yesterday) fixed a bug that prevented Meet from working in Firefox in some cases, such as when privacy.resistFingerprinting was set to true. Give it another go.
    • Wowfunhappy 7y ago
      I can’t say what happened there (Hangouts works fine for me in Firefox), but Zoom won’t let you use Firefox at all if you want audio.
      • seanhunter 7y ago
• mikestew 7y ago
  I have a need for Zoom, virus or no, but the point of the article is why I don't give them money. Give them money, while the company is apparently still going to worry about milking advertising dollars out of me? That's just going to be a strong "no". As the final paragraph of TFA says, either charge more or give away less for free. But if you're selling me out to advertisers after I've given you money, then you're one of "those" companies that I avoid if at all possible. Because they're skeezy. You don't want to appear skeezy, do you, Zoom? So for now Skype and MS Teams works fine, or at least fine enough that I don't bother with Zoom. Which brings me to a side question: what is the value proposition for Zoom? What does their product do so much better than the others that I'd put up with this shit? Why am I hearing the hell out of it lately? Outstanding PR department? EDIT: thanks for your answers to “why use it, then?” Because “it just works” seems to be the summary, which hoo boy, one cannot say about a lot of the competition.
  • binarymax 7y ago
    To answer your last question - it works very well. I've used lots of virtual meeting software over the past 20 years, and zoom is by far the best. I agree with your sentiment though - it makes me angry that they're selling my personal data. But sadly I don't think that any companies will voluntarily be non-skeezy...we really need laws and regulations in this space. I don't trust capitalism to take care of my privacy. If companies can get more money without breaking the law, they will absolutely do so.
    • chadash 7y ago
      Very very well. I haven't seen any issues with zoom and yet mine and everyone else's usage has gone up 10-100x. It's very user friendly and It Just Works. Meanwhile, my company's VOIP acting funny. Conference calls not working. My wife was having issues with skype. Yes, there are alternatives out there, but i'm yet to see one that is easy to use and reliable in the same way.
    • mikestew 7y ago
      That, indeed, answers my last question, thank you. I suspected the answer might be along the lines of “it’s not a tech support shit show”, but my one opportunity to use it this week was cancelled. I’ll try again on Saturday for something someone else is hosting, and find out for myself.
• coder1001 7y ago
  "the best of those, Zoom, is doing very well" Is Zoom really the best? No other comparable platform out there? Anyone know how difficult it would be to build something like it on top of aws or a similar cloud?
  • jamra 7y ago
    Web RTC pretty much handles peer to peer video chat. I think you just need a server to organize the call’s, provide chat, and login from
    • fsh 7y ago
      Peer 2 peer doesn't scale for video conferencing with many users. Jitsi only does it for two participants. Everything larger has to go through the server.
      • ryeguy_24 7y ago
        Why doesn't it scale? Because for n participants, each would need n-1 connections?
        • fsh 7y ago
          Each client has to send n-1 streams and domestic connections usually have quite weak uplink.
          • jessaustin 7y ago
            ISTM there could be some opportunities here? First, not everyone is talking at once (else this is a riot rather than a conference), so many of the uplinks could be "nothing new" packets for much of the time. Second, if any participant(s) (even a dummy participant) has faster uplink, that/those client(s) could forward to the rest of the group, in a fashion somewhat analogous to torrent.
            • 7y ago
• Medicalidiot 7y ago
  I am always very hesitant to say anything personal over any video chat medium unless I know it's end to end encrypted. I know that they're not actively watching my video meetings, but it's still causing a chilling effect in how I conduct myself with their service.
  • angry_octet 7y ago
    Zoom works in China, ergo it is being recorded and analyzed. Automatic voice transcription is a thing.
    • leesalminen 7y ago
      I just realized this yesterday when Zooming with someone in China w/o a VPN.
      • angry_octet 7y ago
        And here it is: https://citizenlab.ca/2020/04/move-fast-roll-your-own-crypto-a-quick-look-at-the-confidentiality-of-zoom-meetings/ https://citizenlab.ca/2020/04/move-fast-roll-your-own-crypto...
  • thekyle 7y ago
    What are some end-to-end encrypted video chat apps? I know Signal offers it but only has one on one calls.
• gnusty_gnurc 7y ago
  I’ve found Jitsi to be more than adequate with no need to download an app onto my computer. Just share the link with my friends!
  • sakopov 7y ago
    I've tried it yesterday with some friends and in my opinion it's not ready for any serious use. The chat feature looks clunky and sometimes messages don't send on first try, especially the drawing board. Sometimes emojis you send in chat get plastered in the top right corner in about 10 times the size and stay there. I've also had the video feed and all controls disappear in the middle of a live session and the only fix was to close the app and sign-in via invite link. Still happy that something like this exists. Just needs a little bit of polish.
    • dhimes 7y ago
      Agree. The big issue is that non-tech people can use zoom. With Jitsi (which I hope to eventually use mostly), you have to be someone who's willing to fool with it a bit to make it work. If some of you 10x programmers would go on a Mission from God and get it going that would be super cool.
      • frabbit 7y ago
        In what way do you have to fool with this? https://meet.jit.si/ https://meet.jit.si/ It is quite possibly the simplest videoconferencing I have ever experienced (Google Hangouts, BlueJeans, Skype for Business and Microsoft Teams being my experience.) I like the Teams experience but the simplicity of just copying an URL from that Jitsi Meet page and having it work within a minute of 5 elderly non-technophile users receiving it in their emails is incredible.
        • dhimes 7y ago
          I don't know. It worked for me but not for the person I tried to connect to. It may have been something trivial, it may have been something difficult. But Zoom worked right away for her so we use that.
• tmpynews 7y ago
  I don't know if it can. Its always bound by its government. By that measure I am really surprised people in large companies trust it. I really am surprised by its adoption.
• bena2005 7y ago
  broken link?
  • thought_alarm 7y ago
    http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:RxLbT_LzyRMJ:https://blogs.harvard.edu/doc/2020/03/27/zoom/&hl=en&gl=ca&strip=1&vwsrc=0 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:RxLbT_L...
• say_it_as_it_is 7y ago
  One major problem for Zoom is that it cannot merely focus on its core video conferencing competency while achieving the growth objectives of a publicly traded company. A high-quality video conferencing platform is hard to replicate until it isn't. The amount of talent and energy being spent right now on video conferencing, as a result of remote work, is going to amount to commoditization of high-quality video conferencing. Zoom has maybe another 12 months of juice left. As a result, it's advancing into new categories and will compete with customers very soon. I'd be very cautious about sharing information with Zoom. You may be showing it where to fish.
  • osrec 7y ago
    So, you think it'll turn into a generalized software consulting company??
    • say_it_as_it_is 7y ago
      No. I think it will be a services provider operating within a "remote economy".
  • thedance 7y ago
    How hard can it possibly be to replicate? Zoom walked into a market packed with established players and now they own the whole thing. That suggests the barriers to entry aren't so great.
    • ShakataGaNai 7y ago
      I think the "high-quality video conferencing" is the "hard to replicate" portion. I've used a lot of different conferencing platform and consistently zoom has been: Relatively easy to use, high quality, reliable. Those last two portions are super critical. No one wants to spend the first 10 minutes of their meeting fighting with their conferencing technology. Also no one wants to sound like robots. With COVID19 and a ton more people working remote, will there be more competition coming into the space? Sure. But it will take them a lot of work, I'd think, to at least meet Zoom's quality and reliability... and do it either so much better or for so much cheaper to warrant change.
• GekkePrutser 7y ago
  Yeah I hate ZOOM sooo much. First there was the issue with them turning on the camera by default. At least you could turn that off. Then there was the spyware they installed on every Mac without even asking for consent. And now this... Since the spyware thing I refuse to install their crap on my machine, but one of our suppliers still uses it and the web client is very choppy.. But they'll just have to put up with it. I'm never installing it again.
  • geoffeg 7y ago
    I also find their UI to be frustrating, especially the chat part of it. I have yet to find a way to make the chat more dense, every message seems to have an excess of white space. Also, at least with the company that I use it with, there's no obvious way to search message history.
    • GekkePrutser 7y ago
      Yeah that's an issue with many 'modern' apps. MS Teams does the same :( I really preferred slack but now that MS throws Teams in for free we have to cope with that.
    • bchociej 7y ago
      Agreed. I find the whole experience to be horrible. Especially having to install some garbage executable rather than using my browser. It does nothing for me that Google Meet doesn't do better.
  • chmaynard 7y ago
    > First there was the issue with them turning on the camera by default. FaceTime does this as well, even when I'm making a phone call via Contacts. I hate it.
    • ThePowerOfFuet 7y ago
      Then press the button with a handset instead of the one with a camera; it's called "FaceTime Audio" for a reason. If you had added them to Favourites and are calling from there, you added FaceTime (video) as the favourite; delete that shortcut and re-add them to Favourites as FaceTime Audio.
• brenden2 7y ago
  Not just Zoom, basically every company.
• meritt 7y ago
  It works really well. One that has been a total game changer for my company is when I'm hosting a conference call, I can simply "Invite by Phone" my participants. They get a phone call, are prompted to "Press 1 to enter the conference", and boom they're in. It's drastically reduced people fumbling around with phone numbers + participant codes, ending up in the wrong meeting, or getting stuck in some unnecessary software install loop. If someone is more than two minutes late, they're getting a phone call that brings them instantly into the meeting. Also a really nice feature, again for phone conferences, is when people dial-in I see their phone number handle in the UI. But during the call as they introduce themselves or I look up their number, I can then rename their user to something recognizable. Now if I'm on a call with 5 people at another firm, I appear really impressive because I know who each person is by their name. When someone is speaking on the conference call, their icon lights up. If someone has a ton of background noise I can easily mute them. Zoom Phone (addl paid feature) is awesome too. Virtual phone numbers, IVR, call routing, busy hours, I can instantly turn a 1:1 conversation into a zoom meeting that other people can join, etc. Zoom Phone works on my iphone like a regular dialer, and I can place/receive fully digital calls on it (pretty similar to how Google Voice works), so it doesn't matter if I have actual cell service. I've never used Microsoft Teams, and does look really snazzy, but Zoom is an absolute joy to use compared to every single other conferencing software I have ever used. The video chat and screensharing is fast and responsive and just works exactly like you would expect it to.
  • Scoundreller 7y ago
    Yep. It just works. First time use is nearly instant. WebEx always took a while to on-board.
  • panpanna 7y ago
    > It works really well. Does it? Asking because I just left a zoom meeting with horrible sound quality and extremely bad video quality. Why would anyone prefer that to Teams is beyond me. Edit: interesting this is _heavily_ downvoted. Can't a person have a bad experience and tell HN about it?
    • stevehawk 7y ago
• ryeguy_24 7y ago
  I get that privacy is important but this company has become a household name over night. My mom literally just installed Zoom because her friends were talking about it (eyeroll). The company has obviously helped the global economy work remotely and keep productivity moving over the past few months. First, thank you to Zoom for making a great product and continue to work under ridiculous load. Secondly, I agree that privacy is an issue but can we tone it down a bit considering the global situation at stake. What am I missing? I'm asking humbly. Because it seems like we are complaining about the food at a homeless shelter?
  • himaraya 7y ago
    1. Paid service 2. Privacy is important.
    • deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
  • catalogia 7y ago
    > I agree that privacy is an issue but can we tone it down a bit considering the global situation at stake. It seems to me that this is the best possible time to make some noise about Zoom's privacy problems. What better time for that could there be than during a period of mass adoption? What better opportunity to shame a company into compliance than during a global pandemic when the responsibilities of companies to the community is being emphasized? You might have a point if castigating Zoom for spying on users somehow facilitated the spread of corona, but it doesn't.
  • exolymph 7y ago
    At what time would it be acceptable to critique Zoom's surveillance practices, in your view? We're not allowed to complain when a useful tool also spies on us?
    • ryeguy_24 7y ago
      Not criticizing the timing. Criticizing the tone. My rule in life is politely ask first, if no response then by all means, bring the wrath. Does anyone know if they've ignored the concern? Everybody assumes every company is a villain these days. Maybe this was an overlooking and they'll happily fix? Anybody ever think of that?
• pearjuice 7y ago
  Did you know they also make a public address book in your entire organization of people on zoom? You can't easily opt out of this. I'm currently contracted at a govt organization which other than mundane conference calls you have to reserve a spot for by email (which nobody does because it's not 1998) doesn't have any remote video/audio infrastructure so basically each team is doing their own thing. Some use zoom, others discord and so forth. A lot of teams started to use zoom and they sign up with their @xyz.gov e-mail. Literally everyone is then public to everyone on @xyz.gov and whether they're currently in a call. Everyone is still on the free plan and reconnecting after 40 minutes (it's basically standard procedure when the 10 minute countdown starts to rejoin). I bet it won't take long before zoom sales get in touch and you think the person going to approve the tailor-made $$$ contract cares about privacy? Or the 700 people already using it except for a small minority who don't have any influence in this kind of decision making?
• skrebbel 7y ago
  Is Zoom-dissing just in fashion these days? In the last few days I've seen these on HN: - Having the Facebook SDK installed in their iOS app, which sends user data to Facebook even if the user has no Facebook account - Having a setting, that's off by default, that lets other callers see whether you have the Zoom app in focus - Having a general "accessibility over security" engineering attitude, which led them to eg shipping their desktop apps with a builtin HTTP server (and with it a much bigger security surface area), just to skip one extra step in the join-meeting-via-a-zoom-link-flow. They removed it after a backlash, but the engineering attitude probably didn't change. Now, I agree that all of these are bad. It's OK for outrage to happen over these things, every single one of them are shit and major companies like Zoom need to get their act together. But I also think that many apps out there do stuff like this. The majority of popular apps, I'd wager. Why is Zoom being singled out? First Vice, now a Harvard blog, a bunch of unsubstantiated tweet storms.. Is it just, en vogue to diss Zoom somehow?
  • catalogia 7y ago
    > Why is Zoom being singled out? There is no conspiracy here, calm down. Zoom is popular, therefore people talk about it.
    • deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
  • kwesthaus 7y ago
    You are right that many pieces of software infringe on privacy. However, Zoom only recently has become one of the most widespread of these and because of that has only recently begun to affect a significant portion of the population, hence why it is newsworthy. I think this also has to do with the fact that Zoom is being used for work and school and therefore people have less choice over their use of it. It's not a social network that many people have chosen to start using, it's a piece of software that millions of students and other people are being required to use without consideration of privacy.
• wintermutestwin 7y ago
  Use case: Mediation Zoom is the only easy to use videoconferencing tool I have found that can do breakout rooms. Mediation is, by law, a confidential process. From the ConsumerReports article: "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." In recommending that my clients use Zoom, am I violating my ethical and legal requirements? Is Zoom breaking the law?
• nsmog767 7y ago
  Of all things, lack of trust and transparency from a video platform is pretty scary. Hard to justify using Zoom any longer. Lifesize is a good alternative that a lot of people don't know about (I have no stake in them, but have used it before).
• kitotik 7y ago
  Clearly they don’t “need” to do a thing. They were already gaining a ton of market share before COVID19, and this has only cemented their position. The people who are concerned about privacy aren’t really the ones writing them big checks anyway.
• oblivionreb 7y ago
  It's a necessary evil for many of us students. Institutions just aren't willing to deal with compatibility/pricing issues with such short notice. Zoom found its niche as a bootstrap crisis averter, I guess
• bangelo 7y ago
  HOW DO YOU THINK THE MODERN INTERNET WORKS
• blntechie 7y ago
  Zoom have had several controversies with its privacy now and still going strong . Great staying power like Facebook. The product must be really good. I have never used them more than in couple occasions and found it like any other web conferencing tool in my opinion.
  • alfalfasprout 7y ago
    Truth is, it has the best video quality I've seen out of any of the video conferencing tools out there by a mile. Only Facetime comes close and it's limited to apple hardware and has more limited screen collaboration tools. As a result, they're going to have staying power.
    • unlinked_dll 7y ago
      Maybe I'm biased but video quality doesn't really bother me nearly as much as audio quality, and Zoom kinda sucks there. Part of it is the codec, but their AEC is so godawful we have to force everyone on calls to use headphones. Video quality is really only necessary when screen sharing, and zoom does OK there.
      • codetrotter 7y ago
        > AEC I haven't heard this abbreviation before but I assume it means Audio Echoing Cancellation.
        • unlinked_dll 7y ago
          Usually Acoustic Echo Cancellation but yes. When it's good you don't notice it (several commercial audio installation products do a great job at it) but when it's bad it's really bad. I'm not sure if Zoom even bothers.
    • quickthrower2 7y ago
      Can’t tell the difference between zoom and slack in terms of video quality. Both are perfect.
• st3fan 7y ago
  Where is the Zoom CEO in this thread?
• gruglife 7y ago
  I have the feeling that outside of the HN community and other tech communities, most people just don't care about this, which is sad.
• guptaneil 7y ago
  If anybody else is wondering about alternatives, DHH sourced some ethical options in this Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/dhh/status/1243248363979419649?s=21 https://twitter.com/dhh/status/1243248363979419649?s=21 Of those, I tried whereby.com yesterday and was blown away. It just works with zero downloads in any browser, including mobile, and is very high quality. From my brief usage, I highly recommend it for small teams.
• AndyPa32 7y ago
  The paid version has a feature where the organization admins can listen and watch in conversations without anybody noticing or giving consent. I am quite sure that doing so would be illegal where I live (Germany).
  • cheeze 7y ago
    That's creeeeeeepy.
  • ShakataGaNai 7y ago
    Unless you gave "consent" in your employment contract, or agreement to the companies employee handbook, AUP or similar documentation. This sort of "agreement to monitoring" is common in a lot of corporations today. Please don't use your company issued hardware/software/network for something not-work related ... and something you wouldn't feel comfortable sharing with most of your colleagues. There is already a plethora of monitoring going on out there.
    • rrix2 7y ago
      Except this person doesnt seem to have been able to give informed consent, which is what German Law is actually looking for. European employment law is much more on the side of employees than in the US, where your comment's nihilism would make me guess you're located... Most GDPR infractions given have been around this exact sort of noncensensual recording and I think the GP comment should be contacting their data protection office or seeking guidance from their company CPO.
    • decebalus1 7y ago
      Not a lawyer, but being a Washington resident (see WA wiretapping laws) interviewing over Zoom (thus not working for that company and no having signed any forms/NDAs/waivers) I'm pretty sure someone snooping in or recording the interview without my consent is illegal.
    • jes5199 7y ago
      This blame-the-victim mentality is not helpful. An employee shouldn't have to be vigilant against their bosses spying on them! Basic human norms don't disappear just because there's fine print in a contract. The idea that "ownership" of hardware gives certain people in a company unchecked power over the people who use that hardware is obscene.
• femmelibre 7y ago
  The case of #poorjennifer calls for major concerns. Every woman should feel safe using Zoom for work, never worry about privacy violation, such as manager videotaping her without her consent, then saving recordings in zoom cloud without her knowledge. Zoom videotaping goes against Privacy Law in California. Consent is diligently required.
• CoffeeDregs 7y ago
  Title is sort of incorrect: "Zoom needs to clean up its privacy act" should be "Zoom needs not to do stupid shit"... I'm a fan of the product but this is ridiculous behavior (great Linux support). I have a hard time imagining the product meeting in which "Yes. That's a good idea. Let's do it." was said. I get that FB is big, that Zoom wants the credibility, etc but that's a sign that management is not thinking clearly about their product and should be a red flag to any investor (among the many green flags from current demand)...
  • thoraway1010 7y ago
    You realize investors are laughing their way to the bank because of the ease of use focus of zoom? The investors in the fully encrypted privacy based video conferencing platforms (yes, they exist) are broke now.
• avmich 7y ago
  > Zoom has an extremely valuable service, which it performs very well—better than anybody else, apparently. Objection - best advertised (or should I say "best" advertised) doesn't equal best. I'd be truly surprised if somebody actually presented convincing arguments that Zoom service is better than anybody else.
• bluntfang 7y ago
  harvard needs to pay their food service workers
• zekrioca 7y ago
  Does any one have any knowledge at how Zoom is architected? I know they own some datacenters, but so does Microsoft, which has a worse service than Zoom.
  • bennofs 7y ago
    An overview is given in their blog post: https://blog.zoom.us/wordpress/2019/06/26/zoom-can-provide-increase-industry-leading-video-capacity/ https://blog.zoom.us/wordpress/2019/06/26/zoom-can-provide-i... However, I would also like to know if there's more to it. Do they do any server side transcoding? Do they get an advantage by having multiple backend servers connected through good links, having clients connected to the nearest one and routing efficiently through their network? It appears that they use(d) H264 as their codec, are there some technical tricks they use to cope with variable bandwidth (do they use scalable video coding or simulcast)?
• wyoh 7y ago
  Can someone explain the advantages of Zoom over a FOSS solution lake Jitsi Meet? https://meet.jit.si/ https://meet.jit.si/
  • nhf 7y ago
    Institutional buy-in and support. When your 40,000 student university's administration declares "we are using Zoom for online classes and it's been integrated into our class management system by IT", it just gets used. And that university chooses to use Zoom over another solution for many reason - after-sales support, SLAs for performance and availability, pre-written API integrations for their CMS and student ID system, guarantees from their sales team about regulatory compliance, and the like.
• sloshnmosh 7y ago
  I am very curious about Zoom’s desktop version as I have seen it used for sensitive telemedicine sessions between doctors and court ordered patients. I think Facebook’s response was disgraceful, putting the onus and blame on the developer after FB developed a plug-in which is no different than malware.
• james_niro 7y ago
  I am using zoom for school with 300 students and it works great. My professors who are not tech savvy were able to use it without problem. Zoom makes recording, screen sharing and chatting much easier than other softwares. Also, I like how easy it is to call in. Also, at my work we use zoom for everything. It is a powerful software that we love.
• deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
• frabbit 7y ago
  Are there any advantages to Zoom over Jitsi Meet? For most people's use case (a small group of family friends) the simplicity and quality of the Jitsi Meet setup is incredible.
• eagsalazar2 7y ago
  This post inspired me to actually try out Jitsi but was put off by their request for access to my Youtube profile when the prompt was "connect your google calendar". WTF? Anyone know what that permission is even about?
• hanoz 7y ago
  As it's beginning to look like my days as a Zoom refusenik are numbered, what is the safest way to use it? Android, iOS, Chomebook, some form of virtualization or container?
  • bchociej 7y ago
    I run it, along with other sketchy garbage proprietary software for wook, in a QEMU VM. Or I just dial in and let people suffer through me being on a phone connection owing to their choice of software.
  • jjgreen 7y ago
    On a disposable laptop on an isolated subnet. Then burn it after use.
• conradev 7y ago
  As other people have stated in this thread everything in Zoom's privacy policy seems to indicate they are sending data to advertisers only as necessary to advertise their own products. They likely: - Use the Facebook iOS SDK to measure conversions from app install ads - Send a list of hashed email addresses to Facebook or other advertisers to do ad re-targeting - Have Google Analytics on their websites to track where people are visiting their website from, i.e. a click on a Google AdWords ad While these are all not _ideal_ because _yes_, Google and Facebook use this data for their own purposes as well, it's far from _nefarious_. In fact, it's pretty standard fare. Could Zoom go above and beyond and reject these tools? Yes, they could. Does anyone in practice? No. If Zoom was selling metadata about their calls, leaking contents of their calls, or themselves served ads – then yes, I'd be concerned. But all indications point to them purchasing ads to further the growth of their business. I think it is perfectly reasonable to seek guarantees around the usage of the above, more sensitive data (contents of video calls, metadata of video calls, etc.) but on the flip side to imply from their privacy policy that they are sending it to Facebook or that they are "in the advertising business" is jumping the gun a little bit.
  • uoaei 7y ago
    > standard fare Aka "common sense" aka "anything that will fit within the Overton window" Not to be confused with "decent, moral behavior"
    • Spivak 7y ago
      I suppose, but why would you single out Zoom and expect them to act more decent and morally than any other company? Is there any reason you would expect this?
      • paulryanrogers 7y ago
        Calling out the biggest players is fine. They have the most resources to roll their own or at least shop around, should they value their users privacy.
    • m463 7y ago
• shaan1 7y ago
  Think twice before using Zoom. They have a lot of engineers in China developing the core technology. You would be foolish to conduct meetings and share sensitive docs over zoom. Communist party is listening to everything. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/26/zoom-key-profit-driver-ahead-of-ipo-engineers-in-china.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/26/zoom-key-profit-driver-ahead...
  • madwhitehatter 7y ago
    Zoom was developed in China Look at the top of page 21 of their sec submission. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1585521/000119312519083351/d642624ds1.htm https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1585521/000119312519...
• afrcnc 7y ago
  I think people are missing the fact that ZOOM doesn't actually clean up its act. It has lots to profit from selling user data.
• chias 7y ago
  I thought this was going to be about their hilarious CSP, which whitelists the following domains: 'unsafe-eval' 'unsafe-inline' blob: https://*.50million.club https://*.adroll.com https://*.cloudfront.net https://*.google.com https://*.hotjar.com https://*.zoom.us https://*.zoomus.cn https://*.zopim.com https://ad.lkqd.net https://ajax.aspnetcdn.com https://apiurl.org https://appsforoffice.microsoft.com https://assets.zendesk.com https://bat.bing.com https://cdn.5bong.com https://cdn.jsdelivr.net https://cdncache-a.akamaihd.net https://code.jquery.com https://connect.facebook.net https://consent.trustarc.com https://extnetcool.com https://fp166.digitaloptout.com https://googleads.g.doubleclick.net https://intljs.rmtag.com https://pi.pardot.com https://px.ads.linkedin.com https://ruanshi2.8686c.com https://rum-static.pingdom.net https://s.dcbap.com https://s.yimg.com https://s.ytimg.com https://s3.amazonaws.com https://scout-cdn.salesloft.com https://sealserver.trustwave.com https://secure-cdn.mplxtms.com https://secure.myshopcouponmac.com https://snap.licdn.com https://sp.analytics.yahoo.com https://srvvtrk.com https://static.zdassets.com https://static2.sharepointonline.com https://tag.demandbase.com https://tpc.googlesyndication.com https://tracking.g2crowd.com https://translate.googleapis.com https://trk.techtarget.com https://unpkg.com https://www.comeet.co https://www.dropbox.com https://www.google-analytics.com https://www.googleadservices.com https://www.googletagmanager.com https://www.gstatic.com https://www.youtube.com https://d.adroll.mgr.consensu.org https://serve2.cheqzone.com https://static.ada.support 'self' via: https://twitter.com/jasvir/status/1242518507683639296 https://twitter.com/jasvir/status/1242518507683639296
  • quickthrower2 7y ago
    Yes unpkg and s3, anyone can get content up on them.
• chandru2 7y ago
  K-12 education uses zoom because it's HIPAA and FERPA compliant. My understanding is that Skype and Hangouts aren't.
• tinyhouse 7y ago
  Do Zoom have their own infrastructure or do they run on aws/azure/gcloud? I think it's amazing how zoom became so popular recently. It's even been approved to be used for Passover Seder dinner by some Rabbis :) It also very popular in academia and reminds me of Dropbox. When I was a student everyone around me used Dropbox. They developed a great product which competes with Google and other giants. But those were all unpaid users and eventually Dropbox moved their focus to Enterprise. Zoom will soon be in a similar situation.
  • Rafuino 7y ago
    I had the same question... It looks like they use AWS, though this paper I found is dated May 2013... https://d24cgw3uvb9a9h.cloudfront.net/static/40580/doc/Zoom-Security-White-Paper.pdf https://d24cgw3uvb9a9h.cloudfront.net/static/40580/doc/Zoom-...
• monadic2 7y ago
  Too little, too late. Corporations cannot be trusted with software.
• mrpippy 7y ago
  I just downloaded Zoom for Mac, saw that it was a .pkg file. Great, I can see what files it installs before I install it. I open the .pkg, click Continue so it can run its script, then a second later Installer quits and the app launches. What?! Turns out, Zoom installs the entire app in the 'preinstall' script of the installer package! Inside there's a copy of '7z', and the app is extracted with that. The preinstall script is littered with typos and poor grammar. I'm not one of those people who thinks that Apple is going to force all Mac software to come through the App Store, but when I see stuff this stupid...I start to wonder.
  • Wowfunhappy 7y ago
    While I also dislike this type of thing, remember that Zoom's business is built on getting people into calls as quickly as possible. Seconds matter. So I can totally understand why they would want to use 7zip to shave kilobytes off the download size.
    • zndr 7y ago
      This is a great point. People understand installers/.pkg files far better than `.app`'s wrapped in a DMG. Those often get launched inside the DMG which has a ton of other issues, rather than being dragged to the Application folder. Also packages allow for easier deployment rather than dmg's.
      • ThePowerOfFuet 7y ago
        This isn't the point, it's the fact that the installer is being abused to install an app without even giving the user the option to proceed or not. Nothing should be installed as part of the preflight. Par for the course with Zoom, so it seems.
        • zndr 7y ago
          I don't think it installs it I think it just calls the resource from the package. NVM I decided to inspect the package with `pkgutil` Here's the offending code ```################################### function install_app_to_path(){ #path=$1 InstallPath="$1/.zoomus_"$(date)"" mkdir -p "$InstallPath" mkdir -p "$InstallPath/Frameworks" if [[ $? != 0 ]] ; then rm -rf "$InstallPath" return 1 fi if [[ -d "$1/zoom.us.app" ]] ; then rm -f "$1/zoom.us.app/Contents/Info.plist" mv "$1/zoom.us.app/Contents" "$InstallPath/trash" fi if [[ $? != 0 ]] ; then rm -rf "$InstallPath" return 4 fi rm -rf "$1/zoom.us.app" if [[ $? != 0 ]] ; then rm -rf "$InstallPath" return 4 fi mdfind 'kMDItemCFBundleIdentifier == "us.zoom.xos"'> .zoom.us.applist.txt echo "["$(date)"]un7z zm.7z =================================" >>"$LOG_PATH" if [[ -f res.7z ]] ; then ./7zr x -mmt ./res.7z -o"$InstallPath/Frameworks"& fi if [[ -f resReitna.7z ]] ; then ./7zr x -mmt ./resReitna.7z -o"$InstallPath/Frameworks"& fi if [[ -f bundles.7z ]] ; then ./7zr x -mmt ./bundles.7z -o"$InstallPath/Frameworks"& fi un7zresult=$(./7zr x -mmt ./zm.7z -o"$InstallPath" 2>>"$LOG_PATH") ret=$? echo "["$(date)"]check un7z return:$ret, $un7zresult">>"$LOG_PATH" wait echo "["$(date)"]un7z all finished">>"$LOG_PATH" if [[ $ret != 0 ]] ; then rm -rf "$InstallPath" return 3 fi mv "$InstallPath/Frameworks/"* "$InstallPath/zoom.us.app/Contents/Frameworks">>"$LOG_PATH" mv "$InstallPath/zoom.us.app" "$1" >>"$LOG_PATH" if [[ $? != 0 ]] ; then rm -rf "$InstallPath" return 1 fi if [[ "$APP_PATH" == "$GLOBAL_APP_PATH" ]] ; then chmod -R 775 "$APP_PATH" chown -R :admin "$APP_PATH" fi echo "["$(date)"]mv $InstallPath/zoom.us.app into $1">>"$LOG_PATH" rm -rf "$InstallPath"& return 0 }```
• jb3689 7y ago
  Zoom should really come out with a public statement (does one exist?). They've been called out a number of times over the past week or few and I think it would be wise for them to clear up any misconceptions (or hide in a turtle shell if they are clearly screwed either way)
• shd4 7y ago
  Zoom needs to fuck off. This is apologism. We need open source and decentralized solution and we need to shut up. I'm tired of this.
  • tomstockmail 7y ago
    I've been using Jitsi Meet https://jitsi.org/jitsi-meet/ https://jitsi.org/jitsi-meet/
    • shd4 7y ago
      Thx! Heard about it already. I'll do a personal analysis and I'll report.
    • shd4 7y ago
      Their branding sucks. Their website / landing page sucks. Their UX / UI sucks. I like the technology behind it though. I'll try to contact someone to see whether I can work for them (with them) for free, or as a volunteer (UI / UX / Web & Product Designer). They deserve better. There's a chance!
  • shd4 7y ago
    Oh yea, I know that there are technical difficulties considering the decentralization. But why aren't we working on it now? Dunno what we're waiting for. Mass adoption?
• tobyhede 7y ago
  If your answer to a privacy concern is "use a Google product" you may not quite understand Google's business model. Zoom is as good as video can be in 2020. Google may be on parity, but tools like WebX are laughably inferior.
• deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
• luminati 7y ago
  Honest question [not trying to act controversial], especially with all the US-China spat. Zoom's engineering team is based in China - the product is primarily built out of there. [1] What guarantee is there that the CCP is not intercepting/backdooring all video communications? Especially in current situations, where so much sensitive information is being discussed via Zoom? [1] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/26/zoom-key-profit-driver-ahead-of-ipo-engineers-in-china.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/26/zoom-key-profit-driver-ahead...
  • systemvoltage 7y ago
    I've said this time and again only to get downvotes since there is no proof or substantiation about the CCP surveillance claims. But, it is an important to keep in mind. There are things that I cannot say due to our employment contract and NDA, but to say the least, we are looking into this matter. Surveillance prospects, doesn't matter where they originate - US or China or Country X - need to be discussed and examined. But apparently, saying anything against China on HN is an automatic ban for creating a flame war. We've become too soft. Obviously personal attacks and racism is not tolerable. But, I would personally (some may disagree) say that we should also criticize bad parts of culture too...that's for another day or a different forum. Can we just get past the my country your country bullshit on HN and talk about privacy implications especially from the world's largest surveillance network? It is one thing to be spied upon for advertisement tracking, an entirely another to be spied upon by a brutal authoritarian government. Fearlessly criticizing CCP or the NSA, or Israeli intelligence agency or whatever... should be one of the most important things to talk about on "Hacker" news forum. I am gonna fire off some anon emails to WSJ/NYTimes/WaPo/Guardian to create some awareness and perhaps they can dig further into Chinese influence in using Zoom. I am deeply concerned. The entire world has given up video/audio/screen/application privacy in a snap... for the data might be stored in Tianjin datacenter, needless to say whose keys are in the hands of CCP - I guarantee that but cannot provide proof. Edit: past comments that were downvoted (and flagged): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22657794 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22657794 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22684767 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22684767 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22663295 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22663295 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22705960 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22705960
• quocble 7y ago
  Wow, hackernews is a cesspool of self-serving "intellectuals". We're in the middle of a pandemic, which already killed 27 thousands people. And the #1 post is privacy act? Can't you guys admit that you didn't come up with video calling company worth 37 Billion dollars. Maybe it's worth talking the positive impact on Zoom during this crisis.
  • FridgeSeal 7y ago
    “This company is doing incredibly shady things and exploiting its sudden boost in popularity, so you guys shouldn’t criticise it, because it’s made soooo much money and you didn’t and it’s therefore above criticism “ That’s how your comment reads. The fact that it’s worth so much is almost completely irrelevant, and if anything, should mean they have more responsibility to do the right thing.
    • quocble 7y ago
      It's a matter priority. If it's a real problem, go sue them. Do you need a Havard op ed to tell you?
• ddrt 7y ago
  Coincidentally NextDNS blocked my use of the Harvard site for bad ad tracking. Hmmm.
• gbrown 7y ago
  One thing I've noticed about it which rubs me the wrong way is that, on Linux, when I exit the application it keeps running in the background. There's no reason that it advertises why this should be necessary, and I don't see any option to disable it. I shouldn't have to manually kill the process to exit a program.
  • ntnsndr 7y ago
    I agree this is annoying, but you can always Exit the program from the icon in the menubar (works for me on both GNOME and xfce).
• liquidify 7y ago
  For a piece of software that initially made claims to having encryption and privacy concerns, yes, yes they do.
• rdxm 7y ago
  so the short response is: no shit!!!
• quantified 7y ago
  Note also at least the unwanted/unnecessary facebook connection: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/k7e599/zoom-ios-app-sends-data-to-facebook-even-if-you-dont-have-a-facebook-account https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/k7e599/zoom-ios-app-sends...
• EastSmith 7y ago
  I've been using zoom for more than a three years now, and I want to know if Zoom is providing transcripts of private 1 on 1 conversations to the room owner. Just to clarify - the zoom room is not mine. We are using it across a group of like 10, for a group meetings - sometimes all of us, sometimes subgroups, sometimes one on one. I can not imagine a world where a company would do that, but given the recent events, I am not ruling out this level of creepines. Zoom?
• tomc1985 7y ago
  Where did Zoom suddenly come from? I never even heard of it until this quarantine stuff, then all of the sudden everyone is talking about videochat on Zoom. It's like WTF, another contender for this throne? Sigh.
• mehrdadn 7y ago
  Zoom Removes Code That Sends Data to Facebook: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22708233 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22708233
• ChicagoDave 7y ago
  I experienced the switch from Webex to Zoom in a corporate office environment and being able to see your meeting on the iPad and clicking start is a huge win. And if you’re in any room you can just connect because it knows where you are. Webex addresses are stupid by comparison. I don’t like this Facebook crap but otherwise Zoom is pretty slick.
• astatine 7y ago
  We have been using Zoom four 4 years now. And it has simplified conferences enormously. Sometimes a few of our customers insist on using their own corporate mandated systems. Half of these times there is a struggle to get the meeting going for one reason or the other. We offer to set up a zoom call and, quite literally, the call is back on track within 2 minutes. Regardless of which country the user is in, the device being used, or any other parameter which somehow seems to trip up all the other systems regularly. I have used Skype, webex, hangout meet, gotomeeting, various other entirely web based ones and none come close to the reliability that Zoom provides. No wonder it's getting adopted like crazy. Kudos to them for handling this traffic with absolutely no visible hiccups.
• ChrisMarshallNY 7y ago
  Probably ninja'd, but it looks like Zoom cleared this up: https://www.vice.com/en_au/article/z3b745/zoom-removes-code-that-sends-data-to-facebook https://www.vice.com/en_au/article/z3b745/zoom-removes-code-...