Blunders Of The Zoom Application Which Is Popular In The Middle Of The COVID-19 Pandemic

Illustration from the Zoom app (Techcrunch)

JAKARTA - The use of the Zoom teleconference application has been skyrocketing lately, especially since the corona virus pandemic. Not a few people use Zoom to work and study from home.

But unfortunately, this application is in trouble because it is said to share the personal data of Zoom users to social media Facebook. Not to mention the teleconference at Zoom is also not end-to-end encrypted, so it doesn't protect the user completely.

Launching the New York Post, a class action lawsuit was filed against Zoom because of the practice of sharing user data with third parties. Moreover, this application is always connected to the Facebook Graph APL without the user's knowledge.

"If Zoom had told its users that it would use inadequate security measures and allow unauthorized third party tracking of their personal information, users would not want to use the Zoom App," said the New York investigating attorney.

The allegations come amid a flurry of questions surrounding Zoom's privacy policy. But quickly, the Electronic Frontier Foundation recently warned that the app would allow them to track participant activity.

Despite these concerns, businesses, schools and even governments continue to use the Zoom app to hold meetings and presentations. Meanwhile, zoom is a popular platform for friends and family to meet virtually.

There was no response to this from Zoom, however Zoom founder Eric Yuan said that the company sincerely apologized for the concern caused by this in a blog post last week.

"We initially implemented the Facebook Login feature using the Facebook SDK for iOS to provide our users with another convenient way to access our platform. However, we were made aware that the Facebook SDK collects device information that is unnecessary for us to provide our services. Privacy of our customers very important to us, and that's why we decided to remove the Facebook SDK in our iOS client, "said Yuan.

The issue, first reported by Motherboard, involved information about the user's device including its operating system, timezone and model, but reportedly did not include information about meetings held on the app. Currently, Zoom users are advised to update the app to the latest version so that their data is no longer sent to Facebook.

Meanwhile, to avoid mistakes like this, SpaceX has banned its employees from using the video conferencing app Zoom as it leaks significant privacy and security concerns. The notification was sent in an email sent to employees last Saturday saying that all access to Zoom had been disabled.

Zoom application on the smartphone (Zoom)

"We understand that many of us use this tool for conferencing and meeting support. Please use email, text, or telephone as an alternative means of communication," wrote the email.

With Zoom's growing popularity, its security practices are also attracting more and more people's attention, as it was also recently discovered a case of hackers sneaking into an ongoing video conference.