Do you know how Zoom is using your data? Here's why you should

1 Apr 2020

The video-call provider has apologised for sending data to Facebook without users’ permission, showing that we must be vigilant about the tech we use

Acouple of months ago, Zoom was a dull, if successful, videoconferencing app that not many people knew about. Now, it is a household name and an integral part of many of our quarantined lives. We conduct business meetings on it; we chat to our mates on it; some people even have sex parties on it.

Yet there are growing concerns over what it does with users’ data. You may think you are working from the privacy of your own home, but the software is probably sharing a lot more information about you than you realise. Zoom has an attention-tracking feature, for example, which notifies the host of some video calls if participants click away to look at something else. The company has actively promoted this feature to educators, explaining it’s a good way to monitor which of your students is slacking off.

In any article about privacy violations, it is pretty much a given that Facebook will be mentioned. This is no exception. Recent analysis by Vice found that Zoom’s iOS app was sending analytics data to Facebook, even when the user did not have a Facebook account and even though this was not addressed in Zoom’s privacy policy. This data included things such as the user’s location and the device’s advertiser identifier information, a unique ID that lets companies send you targeted ads. On Friday, Zoom issued a statement saying “whoops!’” and announcing it had updated its software to stop sending iOS data to Facebook.

I am not saying that you should boycott Zoom and communicate via carrier pigeon. However, as we are forced to live even more of our lives online, let’s not stop holding tech companies to account. Let’s not stop trying to safeguard our right to privacy. Our civil liberties are most fragile during times of crisis. Governments around the world are already using this pandemic to bolster the surveillance state. If we don’t stay vigilant, our privacy will be lost before you can say “Zoom”.

• Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist

[Photo: ‘Let’s not stop holding tech companies such as Zoom to account.’ Photograph: Christian Sinibaldi/The Guardian]