Recently there have been many concerns about the users' privacy in the Zoom conference video meeting app. Due to the recent crisis, most of the people are confined to their home due to lockdown and other health concerns regarding the novel pandemic.
Due to these factors, it has been observed that zoom users have been increased ridiculously these days. People are using zoom conference app to connect across the globe especially to manage their businesses.
But unfortunately, people have criticized zoom due to its weak privacy protection. Many security and privacy issues have been observed during recent days.
In the past zoom has also faced a lot of troubles. In the Zoom app for MAC, it was observed that the zoom app was somehow able to use the camera of MAC without prior permission by the user.
In some cases, it was also observed that people were unable to uninstall zoom from their desktop PC's where Zoom was able to reinstall itself after uninstalling the application.
It was also observed that zoom could send the users' data to Facebook while using Facebook SDK. It was even possible when people didn't have any Facebook account.
Recently during this pandemic, zoombombing is the major zoom security breach that has been observed by the zoom users. It is probably one of the greatest privacy concerns that have been faced by now.
In zoombombing, not only the privacy of the users has been compromised but also other securities. Using the zoombombing, even schoolchildren were bullied and threatened which led them to psychological issues.
Steps Taken by Zoom
In the recent blog by zoom, many steps have been mentioned by the zoom to security issues that have been taken to enhance the privacy protection of the users.
Security Button
In the recent update, the zoom seems to be more concerned about making the users' calls more secure and private.
A new security icon has been introduced right at the toolbar during a video call which lets the people use a new secure connection to make the video call more secures.
This security button allows the users to be more secure by quickly accessing the new features like locking the meeting, enabling the waiting in case if it is disabled, removing participants and restricting participant abilities (e.g. sharing screens, chatting, renaming and annotation), etc.
Hiding User ID
Zoom has taken a new security step of hiding the user ID from the home screen so that in the case of sharing any screenshot of the video call privacy might not be compromised.
These features are equally available for both free basic and paid users of the Zoom Conference Video Calling App in its latest release of version Zoom 5.0.
A new feature of the waiting room is available for the paid users and K-12 program users which is an extra security check before the entry of a person in a meeting.
Disabling Renaming of Participants
Zoom has also made a new change where admin can disable the feature of renaming the participant which will no more allow a participant (which may be an intruder) to conceal its identity by renaming the meeting username.
Although zoom has taken these zoom security reviews to enhance the privacy protection of the users, these are are still inadequate for the need of today. But the good news is that zoom is still committed and it has promised to take steps to enhance security protection of the users.