Not Using Zoom
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If this were a limitation of a free plan, with a paid option offering higher bandwidth, that would be cool, but the only paid options they offer are app integrations starting at $100/mo for 300 users.
It's not inevitable. I use Jitsi every week for a 3+ hour meeting and I haven't seen that error in more than a year.
I don't remember if I ever tracked down what was causing it, but it may have been high latency or low bandwidth on my end (which I resolved about a year ago).
Worked.
Most people don't have a network at home that can handle, say, sending 50 copies of your AV stream when you're speaking to 50 other participants. With that many, even audio-only is a challenge.
There are some clever p2p relay mechanisms you could use in theory to bring the bandwidth down to not grow as much with number of participants (but still a constant factor more than the hub method), but they would add significant latency. For example your AV is sent to one peer, they send it to the next peer, and so on in a chain or tree. This works well for non-real-time AV like p2p distribution of movies, but not real-time meetings.
If multicast IP worked over the internet at large that would help but it doesn't work. Even if it did it wouldn't be enough for the full-vs-thumbnails continuous renegotiation needed to keep download bandwidth steady, nor could it do per-user quality-vs-rate adaptation.
Does this mean Zoom expects their users to take on the legal burden if someone on a call uses a copyrighted image on a PowerPoint slide?
Make no mistake, zoom will prevail in court or any legal proceedings that may come up around this for at least a few years if not indefinitely.
It would take an act of literally Congress or a court ruling that they can’t do this.
So, the only way to get into court and win on this is to have zoom “injure” someone (hard to prove), then that injured person has to have enough money to pay a law firm for lengthy trials with zoom including, to be sure, multiple higher court appeals.
Bottom line, for zoom to be prevented from doing any of this it’s going to cost probably in the millions of dollars of legal fees and fairly significant numbers of people who were injured by this before anything could start to happen to make something like this not possible.
We’ve already been through all of this with social networks, no?
So, perhaps, I would have been fine using it under the previous terms, but under the new terms, I need to be aware the Zoom may, at any point in the future, utilize it for some other, undisclosed, purpose there's no way that I can use it.
How can anyone use Zoom at this point, considering the liability they are foisting onto their customers?
I’m curious if there is a distinction between consumer and business accounts, although based on the responses here, I’m guessing there isn’t one.
When you post on social media, you’re posting information publicly (or semi-publicly). When you say, or show, something on a zoom call, there’s an expectation of privacy between the participants of the call. Zoom is now saying no, there isn’t, because they’re going to use the content of your calls to train their AI.
It seems that Zoom expects you not to use IP material on Zoom and if you do, you are the one to blame. Now that Zoom is harvesting everyone's content, video and transcripts, things will get very, very interesting.
So if you discuss/use company IP on a zoom call, Zoom's future AI can reproduce it freely.
This is a pretty reasonable thing, you're the one who uploaded the material, you're responsible for it, especially since zoom isn't checking/filtering what you upload/share.
Zoom says they might use this data to train their AI. If the AI produces a close-enough copy of copyrighted material or if it spews out company secrets, someone _will_ sue Zoom for this.
There may be a setting you can set in the application to disable this. I don't know, I don't use Zoom.
But in any case, I think you hit the nail on the head. Just from a plain English perspective:
10.1 says that content you (as host or participant) upload to Zoom, may be used by Zoom to provide derivative information. An example listed is transcripts. Both the information you upload, and the information Zoom provides, is "Customer Content". Customer Content is your responsibility.
10.3 and 10.4 covers a wide variety of purposes for which Zoom can use the Customer Content.
10.5 says that Zoom will reasonably protect Customer Content from unauthorized disclosure, etc., but that it has no other obligations with respect to Customer Content. In particular, it can share the Customer Content with their "consultants,contractors, service providers, subprocessors, and other Zoom-authorized third parties accessing, using, collecting, maintaining, processing, storing, and transmitting Customer Content on Zoom’s or your (or your End Users’) behalf in connection with the Services or Software".
17.1, the confidentiality clause, says that Customer Content is not confidential information. That suggest the obligations of confidentiality, such as disclosing to third parties only with a confidentiality agreement in place, do not apply.
So if I'm reading this right, Zoom can disclose your meeting transcripts [edit: I meant audio of your meeting] to a third party, without an obligation of confidence between Zoom and that third party, so long as it is for the purposes of providing you the transcript feature.
Which is really strange, to say the least. At minimum I would expect Zoom to treat Customer Content as confidential.
Wish a lawyer could read this and give us (free) insight.
Absolute BS, this isn't youtube, call it what it is... eavesdropping on two way communication for personal gain. They are misusing IP law to cover their arses for stealing information that is legal to share between the people in the call but not legal for them to steal.
Every business should be fleeing from Zoom right now. All your internal comms are going to be exposed to their LLM... if you have trade secrets discussed over zoom calls, you should assume they can be extracted by others with access to the LLM.
There are still some relics around, e.g. this thread from 2020. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22757697
"our AI models"
"your consent"
From the screenshot: "You are directing Zoom to access, process, and use your participants' inputs and AI-generated content for the purpose of Zoom IQ product improvement, including model training."
Are you claiming that agreeing to these terms of service doesn't count as consent? I think your lawyers would disagree.
Could you please tell us what you do use? Uploaded files? Screenshots from screen sharing?
"without your consent" is also very misleading - you get the account owner's consent, but if I join another company's Zoom meeting and they have this turned on, I am not meaningfully asked for consent. I am informed, but the only way to "opt out" is to leave the meeting immediately (but you already have my face?) and uninstall Zoom. This is obvious coercion, Zoom has majority market share and most people do not have the freedom to decline when somebody sends them a meeting link.
> We do not use audio, video or chat content to train AI models
<Edit: the word “currently” was edited in to the parent comment after I originally quoted it>
What your linked article says:
> When you choose to enable Zoom IQ … you will also be presented with a transparent consent process for training our AI models using your customer content.
Consent or not, these two statements seem to be at odds with each other?
There isn’t room for such ambiguity in this discussion. Details really matter here.
This community has a long memory about previous Zoom security issues and misleading statements (eg about encryption) - so it’s worth understanding that the level of scrutiny being given to this latest topic is likely elevated as a result. (In other words, I think Zoom has some extra work to do to rebuild trust among many of us here).
Most people in Zoom calls at any moment are in calls where they are not the customer for that call. I would guess most Zoom users have never been customers in that sense, as in they never initiate calls and may not have an account.
"We don't use your data to train AI models" (but we can pass it to another entity to do so)
"we would not do so without customer consent" (...and everyone who uses our service has consented to anything we want them to in our convoluted ToS.
What you should have said is: "Zoom doesn't use audio, video or chat content to do anything but transmit it to the parties that are logged in to the meeting."
I frequently have to use Zoom for communications that are privileged by law. I wonder when the class action will happen?
"Better to ask for forgiveness than for permission."
See also Uber, who broke the rules and got away with it, and in fact built their empire on top of breaking the law.
We should not let companies get away with this. In fact, CEOs of such companies should face prison time. Otherwise it would be too easy to steal your user's data, let your company go bankrupt and start a new company based on the stolen data.
Thankfully we're starting to see legislation being rolled out in a lot of areas with reasonably large penalties for this approach (e.g. 4% of the company's global revenue for the EU).
At the very least, it is happening internally in R&D projects and there will be a raft a roll-outs. How many of those will be floated quietly for "testing" purposes before being rolled out in a public way? Will ToS be updated to reflect it?
We have already seen with Microsoft, that they are more than willing to implement and train these kinds of systems and roll them out without any kind of opt-in or up-front disclosure. And if you don't like it, you can just stop using O365, GitHub, Azure, etc. Good luck with that. You've got to convince the higher-ups that this is a real issue that they should absolutely care about. For many organizations, you just aren't going to get traction there because they likely own a bunch of MS stock and are happy to see the value extracted from their own company if it boosts their net worth in other ways.
My question is: what are you doing for work where you can just decline any invitation that comes from a specific service? That's not realistic at all for most people. Is there a solution for those people?
I'd still prefer it if they had far tighter language and clarity on how they use user data, but the tech crowd feels like it's off in conspiracy land.
If there is any actual evidence that they are using large amounts of private call data to train a generative AI then I'd really like to see that.
I don't think Zoom is at fault for wanting or needing to use AIs or plan to, on the streams. They might even be ahead of the game. But their communication about it is rather weasely at the moment, and their COO and CISO comments on here don't help with that.
- Zoom
- Google Meet
- MS Teams
- Jitsi (free)
I try and avoid Google products where I can but it seems like the least worst option here (I use Jitsi when I can but it's limited). Is there a 5th option out there?
I have tried Discord, it's reasonable, but the UX is kinda crazy for anyone not used to it - very hard to convince non-gamers to use it.
Perhaps BigBlueButton would be another reasonable option?
Their paid service allows you to tweak this but it starts at $100/mo.
Have never tried BBB & I'm starting to see a lot of folk recommending it here now as I read through the comments... is it available as a service or is it purely a self-host option (website appears to imply the latter at first but I haven't dug into it yet).
Competence is always in short supplly, though.
When working with a trainer for my language/pronunciation I also found out that many solutions have abysmal sound quality, Zoom is best by far.
Jitsi - core functionality issues with video quality tied to network setups perhaps make it a no go.
If you work with a lot of folks for short bits of time everyone knows how to get on and work a zoom call.
Teams has weird permissions issues, consumer vs business teams, and is forced on so many people that they auto close it (reminds me a bit of the IE pushiness which can be a turn off).
Google Meet started auto-adding links to meetings - so most folks ignore a google meet link because they don't think it's a real meeting (and 90% of time it isn't).
You can disable that default company wide and force people to manually add it if desired.
Why not? You click on the link and if Teams is installed it opens the local copy. If not then you can do the call in a browser. What is the difficulty?
But it might be different today, for those problems I try to not use Teams for some time.
Also if you use Teams all the time the experience might be different.
IANAL but that's not quite what the terms say.
>25. INDEMNIFICATION
>To the extent not prohibited by applicable Law, you agree to indemnify, defend, and hold Zoom and its affiliates and each of our licensors and suppliers (“Indemnified Parties”) harmless, including any officers, directors, employees, shareholders, members, consultants, and agents of the Indemnified Parties, from any third party allegation, claim, proceeding, liability, damage, or cost (including reasonable attorneys’ fees) arising out of or related to (i) your or your End User’s use of the Services or Software, (ii) your or your End User’s breach of this Agreement or violation of applicable Law, (iii) your or your End User’s infringement or violation of any Proprietary Rights or other right of any person or entity, (iv) your relationship with your End User or any dispute between you and your End User, or (v) a personal injury or property damage to a third party relating to your or your End User’s acts or omissions
(emphasis mine)
You'd really have to stretch the definition of "your or your End User’s use of the Services or Software" to include zoom running their AI training (unbeknownst to the user) for it to be included. What this clause is intended to cover is cases like you using zoom to commit some sort of crime (eg. streaming movies/sports matches), and zoom gets used along with you.
> your or your End User’s infringement or violation of any Proprietary Rights or other right of any person or entity
I'm also curious what the ToS says about teams, if it allows it I'd be pretty disgusted and I was very surprised Zoom does this..
I think it's going to lose them more customers than make them money... but we'll see.
MS is a more interesting case, because they have a tradition of understanding enterprise concerns, and don't really need the data from Teams given their product portfolio.
But, common strategic sense often doesn't stop tactical, myopic product manager blunders, so I am curious.
We will indeed. Given the vast, vast majority of users' reading of TOS in the first place, much less understanding them, this to me seems very unlikely.
https://support.google.com/meet/answer/9852160#zippy=%2Cpriv...
"Google does not store video, audio, or chat data unless a meeting participant initiates a recording during the Meet session."
https://support.google.com/meet/answer/11605714?hl=en&ref_to...
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/08/07/zoom-ai-tools-trained-using-...
> Notwithstanding the above, Zoom will not use audio, video or chat Customer Content to train our artificial intelligence models without your consent.
Right. And you've given consent by agreeing to the terms in the first sentence:
> You agree to grant and hereby grant Zoom [an absolute] license and all other rights...to perform all acts with respect to the Customer Content...
How do you get a whole organization of several thousand people to move from zoom to another platform? In my experience, this has only happened because the provider simply could not meet the QoS/ToS, or they were priced out.
Also, most people just don't care. They just want something working well. We've got Cisco webex and Microsoft teams, but guess what most people prefer? Zoom. Because "it just works better".
* Most of the legal terms are standard for internet services.
* Any and all unencrypted internet communication will be monitored by the services hosting that communication.
* If we replace "AI" with "automation tools", then this is a nothing burger.
Or to put it another way, Does anyone really think Zoom (or other internet services) aren't running automated tools to catch/ block/ report child porn? How do folks think those automation tools are trained?
If you don't want service providers monitoring your communication, ENCRYPT IT. Otherwise, it doesn't matter if they're using the "AI" boogeyman or older automation tools.
[1] https://media.defense.gov/2020/Aug/14/2002477667/-1/-1/0/CSI...
At Zoom, we do not use customer audio, video, and chat to train our generative AI models without customer consent.
You can learn more about enabling generative AI features, consent, and notice here: https://blog.zoom.us/zooms-term-service-ai/
Explicitly stating that user data will not be used unless someone affirmatively opts-in in the agreement would be a good step.
What is the mechanism you use for "customer consent"?
IIUC, you have a pop-up at call initiation for which you either provide "consent," or drop the call, with no option to deny consent and continue.
If that's correct, then your definition of "customer consent" doesn't comport with the broadly understood idea of consent. Rather, it's closer to "if you enter my store, you consent to spending at least USD$20. If you don't actually spend that much on our offerings, we will charge the balance as a fee," than to true consent.
That's not to say that Zoom shouldn't have the right to require such consent to use their service, but based on my understanding, the mechanism for obtaining such consent is coercive and exploitative.
I think it is misleading to use the word "customer" here without drawing attention to the fact that is not the meeting participant.
It that intentional? Different people have a different idea of what "customer" means, in the context of a discussion about an online meetings product, when they are not paying attention. As a CISO who is surely aware of social engineering's role in data security, I'm sure you know this.
And in a context where people individiully agree the terms of service by clicking "I agree", often on their own computer, people mostly think of the customer as themselves.
So who is meant by "customers" in your comment, and your COO's comment, who consent (or not) to AI training on their data? All the people attending the meeting, or the entity who owns the Zoom account only?
Does each person attending a Zoom meeting have to give consent for their likeness and personal data to be used?
The people who actually care about their personal data being used in this way are the people attending the meeting. Everyone knows this intuitively, and that's why wordings around whose consent is involved need to be clear and unambiguous, and sound like weasel-wording if they are not, or if they imply it is delegated to one party in the meeting that the others may not entirely trust with that kind of data.
Scratch that. I read your link. It says quite clearly that "Zoom account owners and administrators control whether to enable these AI features for their accounts."
In other words, people attending the meeting are not in control of whether their personal likeness and data is used to train AI models.
Indeed that's the case. There is a reply to your COO's comment on here, saying that when a person joins a meeting they are given no option to consent or decline, except to leave the meeting.
In real life, that means things like a person attends a job interview online, and suddenly faces the surprise realisation at the moment they are about to start that they have no realistic choice but to continue with an AI being trained on how they talk and smile at their job interview, for example. Or they start a job, and discover that's what's happening with their team standups. Not everyone will mind, but it sure feels like Zoom may be facilitating something more invasive than before, where you could normally assume a meeting was private to the participants and ephemeral, if it's not explicitly recorded.
I expect you're aware that people would not take that interpretation from the comment you posted here on a casual reading.
Please don't do that. If you must explain under what conditions Zoom uses user data, please don't use the kind of flexible wording, like "customer", that will cause many people to think each person installing Zoom and clicking "I agree" is in control. Please be more consistent in public statements by saying something more like:
The Zoom account owner and administrators control when the meeting participants' personal likeness and data is used for AI training.
Your COO's comment on here says Zoom "currently do not use audio, video or chat content to train AI models [and we would not do so without customer consent]". But your statement imply that Zoom does currently use audio, video and chat to train AI models under some circumstances.
That has led one commenter to say that your COO is straight up lying, but I would be inclined to say the wording urgently needs clarification, in plain English using words that people are not likely to misinterpret, or feel like they are being tricked by.
All this is not a good look if you care to maintain a trustworthy reputation. That people using Zoom can have confidence in. As someone correctly pointed out, Zoom already has a tainted reputation around user data. I think your product is great and I use it often in large meetings. I prefer it over all alternatives I've tried because it works well. I also think Zoom has managed to mostly recover from previous reputation hits. But other products are catching up, and I'll end up advocating against Zoom myself if I think the C-suite is a tag team of weasel-worders who'd like to keep the door of ambiguity open ajar on something as central to meetings as this. People's ability to feel safe when talking to each other is sacrosanct.
Our updated blog clarifies our approach: https://blog.zoom.us/zooms-term-service-ai/
Most importantly - we’ve updated our terms of service (in section 10.4) to further confirm that we will not use audio, video, or chat customer content to train our artificial intelligence models without your consent.
I would much prefer to see users empowered to not just be "notified" of an account admin's decision but to have per-user consent. Regardless of what my employer (or a collaborator's employer) might think, I do not consent to feeding my voice, video, or screenshare content into AI training.
And I think there should be a middle ground between "tolerate the admin's decision" and "don't participate". I understand certain scenarios require this, such as recording of all contributions to an important meeting. But, I don't think you should apply this heavy-handed approach to other derivative use. A user should be able to communicate with peers without being coerced into consent for all other usage an account admin might be interested in...
If Jitsi doesn't require a user account, how do they prevent a bunch of random bots using up all their resources with sybil attacks?
How do they pay for all that bandwidth, for TURN servers etc?
What are the economics of it basically
That part isn't really correct? Most firewalls block incoming connections not outgoing ones so both parties agree on a port, hole punching happens and then there is a connection is formed.
(Brave also didn't work but refreshing multiple times worked, don't know, why MS wants to pinpoint Edge or Chrome for Teams)
If it's for any technical reason, I've been using Teams in Firefox for many months already, and meetings run just fine.
After passing my company's azure SSO login prompts all I got was an error message I had to use Chrome or Mirosoft Edge
Normal Teams do