Ask HN: Why does Zoom Desktop examine all processes and arguments?

Post by hashhar » Wed, Aug 18, 2021, 10:40 AM UTC

vishho wrote: post #158

Zoom has attention tracking, which when enabled silently, shows an admin if the screen is maximized or if the user is focused on other applications. They don't yet tell admins what other apps the user is active in, just whether the user is active. Another angle for Zoom to do that, is that it is a massive Chinese spyware application, which can target users by meta data or IP, like it did by messing with the calls of…

Post by agumonkey » Wed, Aug 18, 2021, 11:12 AM UTC

acatton wrote: post #150

xfitm3 wrote: post #136

It not only examines all processes and arguments - it leverages the microphone to act on ultrasonic cues for "integrations". Zoom is a privacy dumpster fire. https://devforum.zoom.us/t/ultrasonic-connection/3318

It also plays your user-name (when configured by the meeting owner) in the background at a non-audible frequency, so that companies can find out who leaked their meetings by analysing the audio from the leak. https://theintercept.com/2021/01/18/leak-zoom-meeting/

Post by cygned » Wed, Aug 18, 2021, 11:28 AM UTC

dylan604 wrote: post #131

TameAntelope wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I literally quit all messaging apps when presenting to people for any period of time more than ~10s.

You could also disable notifications if your OS has that kind of feature. Mine does, so I took advantage of that after the first incident of being interrupted. It's a nice feature.

Post by eertami » Wed, Aug 18, 2021, 12:22 PM UTC

scubbo wrote: post #133

eertami wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The audio and video quality, ... is much better in the desktop app But is the quality actually better, or is it post-processing tricks to make it seem better on commodity hardware/audio setups? If it is actually better, surely this should be measurable and there should exist evidence to support such a claim.

> is the quality actually better, or is it post-processing tricks to make it seem better Serious question - if the experience is the same, why does this distinction matter?

Post by acatton » Wed, Aug 18, 2021, 12:34 PM UTC

bamboozled wrote: post #240

acatton wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a way to see it. I see it differently, for me the main issue is the fact that people run random software that were not even vetted. If you dnf/apt install everything from the official repos of your distro, you wont have any misbehaving apps. And that model still holds. And as I explained, other security models don't work either. People will just whitelist the app, or click "Accept" anyway, because they want t…

If you dnf/apt install everything from the official repos of your distro, you wont have any misbehaving apps. And that model still holds. How do you know this? I hear this a lot, I've built packages myself, only because I needed them in a hurry. I never really went through the source code to make sure it's safe. Maybe others did, but I didn't, people installed the package, maybe they were hacked, who knows? Just sayi…