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Comment by Jaygles | Hacker News Reader

I have a similar story but the opposite end of things. I was listening in to a large meeting (>200 people) and the presenter decided to UN-mute everybody's microphones. I still can't believe I didn't hear any explicit or unprofessional things that day. That really was a dangerous move.

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Christ, what software lets you do that?

It can be annoying that Teams lets you mute but not unmute people, but thank god it doesn't.

It was Zoom. Apparently once you allow a host to unmute you remotely, they are able to do so until you revoke the permission. I don't remember allowing that, although its possible I did and forgot about it.

From my experience, if you are unmuted, and the host mutes you, they can unmute you again. If you mute yourself, the host is unable to unmute you.

Huh, once I believe someone muted me then tried to unmute me and I got a popup saying the host wants me to unmute. I'm pretty sure I didn't mute myself; I was in the middle of talking, and my hands weren't even on my mouse or keyboard. There was someone else making background noise, so I believe the host tried to mute that person, accidentally muted me, then tried to unmute me causing me to get the popup.

If you have muted yourself, the host has a button that says "ask to unmute".

Huh. Can you take over a host’s mute for a personal mute? Ie. Host mutes me. Some time goes by and I decide to watch YouTube. How do I take a personal mute so that i can’t be unmuted?

Quickly unmute, then mute again.

This is why you use a microphone with a physical mute button.

Webex lets you configure meeting options to allow the host to unmute anyone.

I’ve never tried it myself as the mere concept of doing so is a huge invasion of privacy, but after learning that any meeting could have this option enabled, I no longer assume that my muted mic will stay that way.

Get a mic with a physical button or switch to mute.

Or use Qubes OS.

I suspect it was implemented so the presenter could help help less technically ept people.

Wow. It never occurred to me that such a thing was even possible. Glad I dial in with my phone and use it's mute instead.

Zoom also allows the camera forced to on when joining. A colleague once dialed in from her bed.. Fair enough to her it was 9pm in India.

For this reason I always keep my laptop Mike volume to 0, and use the mute button on my headset which is not computer controlled. And an external webcam which I can plug in when I want to.

>Zoom also allows the camera forced to on when joining.

In Zoom on Windows I go to Settings > Video > check Turn off video when joining meeting

I'm pretty sure that will stop anyone from forcing my camera on. But I think that setting defaults to unchecked, meaning by default Zoom automatically shows your video.

For extra protection:

Settings > Audio > uncheck Automatically join audio by computer when joining a meeting

Settings > Audio > check Mute my microphone when joining a meeting

Settings > Audio > uncheck Press and hold SPACE key to temporarily unmute yourself.

I also generally join a bogus empty meeting before any real meeting to preview and ensure my microphone, webcam, virtual background, filters, and studio effects are all the way I want them and not something silly from some playful meeting yesterday.

For extra protection cover your webcam :) That should work.

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