Zoom is back in the news again. But don’t worry — it’s the good kind of news this time.
We’ve summarized many of the dangers associated with using Zoom. We’ve given you a list of our favorite replacements. We’ve even detailed the various steps you could take to make Google Meet feel just like Zoom with the help of a third-party extension.
But it’s about time we start talking about whether it’s safe to use Zoom. Starting July 2020, the answer to that question will be a resounding “we think so.” After receiving loads of criticism from numerous cybersecurity experts (like us), government officials (like the FBI), and general consumers (like you) over security concerns, Zoom is turning a corner.
We saw the company announce plans for full end-to-end encryption (E2EE) in late May, which still resulted in a fair share of negative attention considering Zoom’s E2EE would only be offered to its paying customers. But just a few weeks later, the company announced it would instead be offering E2EE to its free users as well starting sometime in July. Broke users rejoice.
"We have identified a path forward that balances the legitimate right of all users to privacy and the safety of users on our platform," Zoom CEO Eric S. Yuan wrote. "This will enable us to offer E2EE as an advanced add-on feature for all of our users around the globe -- free and paid -- while maintaining the ability to prevent and fight abuse on our platform."
Zoom states that AES 256 GCM transport encryption will remain the default encryption method for all users. You don’t necessarily need to know what that is, just know that Zoom is describing it as “one of the strongest encryption standards in use today.” But “one of the strongest” is not “the strongest,” so we find ourselves here today.
A beta for free E2EE will arrive in July, although it’s unclear when it will be distributed out to the masses.
Users will have to manually toggle E2EE if they want to use it, but Zoom notes that activating the increased security will limit other features, such as the traditional Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) phone lines or certain conference room hardware. Zoom also says Free/Basic users seeking E2EE will first need to verify their phone number via text message. This will ultimately be used to prevent people from “Zoom-bombing,” the company states.
Not a very big ask for what you’re getting in return, if you ask us.
Add this to a critical update to Zoom 5.0 aimed at addressing earlier zero-day exploits, and this has the potential to be a big win for users across the board — and not just those using Zoom.
If you’ll recall an earlier blog post, we took a deep dive into a handful of video conferencing platforms you should consider in place of Zoom. You may recall that only a few of those options — but not our beloved Slack — offer what Zoom is poised to dish out next month: End-to-end encryption for the low, low price of $0/month. Think of all the toilet paper you could stock up on with those savings.
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Let me say that again: Zoom, already considered the biggest player in the video conferencing game, just improved the heck out of its security practices, eliminating any technical advantages that Google Meet or Slack had just a few weeks ago.
Competition drives innovation. But see, here’s the thing — it’s typically those in second, third, and fourth place who decide innovation is necessary. When the gold medalist innovates? Welcome to Yikes City, competition.
There’s a reason Mario Kart reserves the blue shell for its last-place drivers and not those in first. And yet here Zoom is, taunting those in the rearview mirror with the equalizer it never really needed to begin with.
Whether or not we’ll soon see Slack and Google Meet start offering free E2EE remains to be seen, but it’s clear the two companies will need to make some strides if they want a chance at the throne.
And chances are they probably do.
Zoom, like bidets and poorly worn facemasks, grew massively in popularity thanks in large part to the COVID-19 pandemic response earlier this year. The company watched its userbase grow from 10 million daily meeting participants in December 2019 to a stunning 300 million just five months later. And that’s despite it being dragged through the mud for the entire month of April over serious privacy concerns.
For reference, Google Meet announced it reached 100 million daily meeting participants in late April. Microsoft Teams announced it reached more than 70 million daily users in April, while Slack has yet to indicate what sort of growth it’s seen since celebrating its now-paltry 12.5 million daily users in mid March.
And keep this in mind: Many of those 300 million daily users didn’t even care that Zoom was dealing with serious security issues. No matter how hard we tried to warn them.
Zoom will likely hold on to many of those users, as well as snatch up anybody else looking for top-flight encryption that many of its competitors simply aren’t offering.