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Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

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Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#201

Post by f1refly »

brewdad wrote: post #28
baal80spam wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> everyone uses Zoom Well, my org uses Teams and I don't know anyone who uses Zoom professionally.

My son's university has been holding tons of virtual sessions for incoming first-year students and their parents. Every one has been on Zoom. In my experience, Zoom is the standard when you are dealing with the public at large. Teams/Hangouts/WebEx, etc are the go to options when dealing with an internal organization where all of the users are "known" ahead of time.

At my university the computer science + electrical engineering student councils protested so persistently that the university gave in and banned zoom across operations. I guess not every university was so lucky?

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#202

Post by Beldin »

sombremesa wrote: post #127
acdha wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which UX problem do you think it fixed? If I had to rate by the ability to successfully start a call and not have technical issues interrupt it, I'd rank Zoom, Teams, Slack, and Google Meet roughly equivalent — the quality isn't as good or robust as Facetime but that's also not designed for meetings or cross-platform. I'd accept Google self-selecting out of the market with their incoherent messaging strategy but that…

When Zoom first came onto the scene, the other technologies you've listed had more friction than coarse grained sandpaper. Zoom was the very first to let people join meetings without a) signing up; and b) downloading anything. I don't know about all the solutions you've listed, but Google Meet for example still requires an account whereas Zoom still does not. As more and more people use Zoom, the friction of using it…

Pre-pandemic, I used both Bluejeans and (Blackboard.com's) Collaborate Ultra. Bluejeans already let you use your phone years before. Neither required an account for anyone but meeting organiser. Collaborate Ultra doesn't even have a native app (as far as I know), it only has a web app.

I have no idea why so many folks like Zoom; I find it to be less useful than either. E.g. using external monitor with different resolution is handled very poorly.

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#203

Post by raxxorrax »

rblatz wrote: post #9
swiley wrote: post #2

Wait, governments are still using zoom? WTF?

I don’t know what rock you are living under but everyone uses Zoom. Even Cisco sales reps use it for sales meetings and they own WebEx.

I have never seen it in a professional setting and I sadly have too many meetings. In my corporate world at least it is almost always teams and people don't want to use zoom. Sales might be different though.

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#204

Post by raxxorrax »

nsizx wrote: post #4
swiley wrote: post #2

Wait, governments are still using zoom? WTF?

What should they use instead, some half assed open source solution subcontracted to the usual cronies of the consulting business?

Where do you live where that is common?

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#205

Post by illiac786 »

hobofan wrote: post #119
saiya-jin wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Must be your specific webex/connection settings/version then, we have it in our massive banking corps (90k+employees worldwide) and none of the things you describe are an issue. We have adopted it some 7 years ago. You don't need to run it in browser at all, there are desktop (and phone) clients for every major OS out there. This shows that you are really not familiar with it. Now it is still a crappy system, but for…

The 1000 slightly different versions of Webex that are all bundeled under the same brand are its biggest drawback. My university uses it as well, and the normal latest version of Webex is on par with Zoom. However for some courses the lecutrers use e.g. Webex Training which is barely usable garbage (but is the only version that has built-in quiz features).

My company uses webex since years and quizz is now built into the Webex Meetings app as they bought slido. I agree though that Webex Training, Webex Support, and some very old webex versions are just terrible.

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#206

Post by illiac786 »

iso1210 wrote: post #38
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #6

Offer a comparable alternative, then. I spend half my day on meetings either internally or with clients, and every time I have to jump on a client meeting with Microsoft Teams/Google Hangouts/WebEx/GotoMeeting because their company bans Zoom, it's a recipe for a fruitless meeting. Someone will fumble the sharing controls; screens will take forever to present; at least one person's microphone will become inaudible, st…

Webex is so shockingly bad. Zoom, Teams, Slack, all seem to work fairly well, all have clients (and can run in the browser) Webex - which I have to use as part of a university course I'm doing on the side - requires you to run it in a browser on my OS, it has really awful options (like allowing the presenter to unmute people), half the claimed features just aren't available (virtual whiteboard, no major loss as every…

why is running in a browser so bad? Lots of people actually WANT this feature, as they do not want to install native apps.

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#207

Post by illiac786 »

croes wrote: post #95
geofft wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically yes, but practically, if someone can't get their job done without breaking rules, they're going to break the rules. If your goal is actual compliance with rules, giving people a way to comply is much more effective.

Tell that the software companies. You can't demand to change the maw just because software companies want to illegaly collect data from their users. Why are people always complaining about data protection officers but not the shitty software companies. They have the tracking and the bugs which endanger their users and most of the time they won't even get punished.

100% agree. Data privacy _is_ doable. Yes, it's added complexity, but software companies make it out to be much worse than what it actually is — and people believe them. These large software companies just don't want the inherent risk associated with saying "I comply with data privacy law XYZ" – because if they actually don't because they missed something, they will be sued for a lot of money. It's just about money, nothing new.

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#208

Post by illiac786 »

hef19898 wrote: post #110
badLiveware wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe that the government in Hamburg and the Bundeswehr are implementing(or has already) element and matrix. https://element.io/pro/federation-collaboration

The latter organisation is not necessarily a benchmark in IT, or organisation in general.

name one army which is. (Bundeswher is the german army)

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#209

Post by detaro »

cannabis_sam wrote: post #121

I feel like I live in a bizzaro world... First, I’ve been working remotely over skype, audio-only, for over a decade. Yet in 2020 and with the emergence of zoom, it’s suddenly become an expectation that everyone is incessantly and awkwardly staring at each other through screens for the whole workday. Second, the few times I’ve used Zoom it’s been absolutely garbage, with video and sound dropping or just not there (th…

That's far from universal expectation. I use the camera almost exclusively in primarily social calls (and sometimes one-on-one calls). Even when talking to customers its rare.

Re: Stop using Zoom, Hamburg’s data protection agency warns state government

#210

Post by illiac786 »

e40 wrote: post #160
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #6

Offer a comparable alternative, then. I spend half my day on meetings either internally or with clients, and every time I have to jump on a client meeting with Microsoft Teams/Google Hangouts/WebEx/GotoMeeting because their company bans Zoom, it's a recipe for a fruitless meeting. Someone will fumble the sharing controls; screens will take forever to present; at least one person's microphone will become inaudible, st…

Yeah, it's amazing to me the hate people have for Zoom. I feel about Zoom like Garp felt about the plane that hit the house he was looking at buying. When the real estate agent said he wouldn't want to buy it now, he said The odds of another plane hitting this house are astronomical! and bought the house. I think it's unlikely Zoom will jeopardize their leadership by not taking security and privacy seriously.

two wrong assumptions:

* not taking security seriously can jeopardize their leadership (they're the de facto standard and no one cares about security as seen in these comments)

* Zoom is already taking security seriously - I seriously doubt it with all development being in China.

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