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Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

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Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#521

Post by nix23 »

bananabreakfast wrote: post #332
longtom wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Google really any better? They may simply be better at hiding their surveillance apparatus. We need to decentralize, i.e. destroy large non-decentralized organizations.

Absolutely, don't be ridiculous. Google is not and will never be complicit to Chinese censorship in America. This is classic whataboutism and we don't benefit from such hyperbole.

>Google is not and will never be complicit to Chinese censorship in America

Uhh that's a strong stand for something you don't know...especially the 'never' part of it.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#522

Post by nix23 »

vectorrain wrote: post #480
HenryBemis wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> surveilling Zoom calls en masse? Documenting participants (face, voice, language, location, etc.), The first time I read that Zoom is the shell (in the USA) while the majority of work is being done in China, I thought the exact same thing. That China has everyone's face 3D scanned by now (multiple photos from multiple angles), everyone's voiceprint, everyone's IP, transcripts of what was said and by who... Now they…

"That China has everyone's face 3D scanned by now (multiple photos from multiple angles), everyone's voiceprint, everyone's IP, transcripts of what was said and by who" As a native Chinese, I haven't been scanned by 3D scanner. How do you get this conclusion?

You don't need a 3D-Scanner for that, just a moving head and some minutes/seconds of video-material.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#525

Post by feanaro »

Aunche wrote: post #294
reaperducer wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

does the presumption of innocence mean nothing anymore In a court of law, yes. In the court of public opinion, it has never been that way. I don't blame people for being suspicious of Zoom. Why wait until the harm has already been done to move to something else? Zoom knows it has a credibility problem. If Zoom really cared, it would do something to distance itself from China and the Chinese government. But it doesn't…

I don't blame people for being suspicious of Zoom either. I just find it sad that so many readers of Hackernews are endorsing logic that is so unscientific.

In what way is it "unscientific"? That's an odd choice of words in this situation. What we're aiming for is rational and in this instance, it's perfectly rational to be suspicious based on an abductive argument and unproven extrapolation. As another commenter aptly noticed, once you're able to prove it, the harm has already been done.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#526

Post by feanaro »

chrisseaton wrote: post #173
ciarannolan wrote: post #8

I feel like the good faith presumption for this company has to have shifted by now. Is there any reason not to assume that the Chinese government is surveilling Zoom calls en masse? Documenting participants (face, voice, language, location, etc.), recording content, etc. We're talking about the data of 200M+ users. I see people on HN defending Zoom all the time. >The company has acknowledged that much of its product…

> Is there any reason not to assume that the Chinese government is surveilling Zoom calls en masse? Always assume your calls on the public internet are being surveilled by all parties, no matter which service you're using. But beside that... if they were surveilling them... why would they close them? Why would you shut down your intelligence source?

Why would I necessarily assume my end-to-end encrypted calls with a trusted party are being surveilled?

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#527

Post by ace32229 »

angott wrote: post #319
Polylactic_acid wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iirc google also banned the installation of the zoom client on work devices.

To be honest, that's also because they probably want their employees to use one of their 37 different video-conferencing apps.

Sounds like a Silicon Valley scene!

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#528

Post by chrisseaton »

feanaro wrote: post #526
chrisseaton wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is there any reason not to assume that the Chinese government is surveilling Zoom calls en masse? Always assume your calls on the public internet are being surveilled by all parties, no matter which service you're using. But beside that... if they were surveilling them... why would they close them? Why would you shut down your intelligence source?

Why would I necessarily assume my end-to-end encrypted calls with a trusted party are being surveilled?

Because your software may be compromised.

Because your hardware may be compromised.

Because their software may be compromised.

Because their hardware may be compromised.

Because the cryptographic algorithm you're using may be compromised.

Because your 'trusted party' may be compromised.

Because there may be a camera in your room.

Because there may be a camera in their room.

Lots of threat vectors, lots of reasons to assume surveillance.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#529

Post by stronglikedan »

_b3dj wrote: post #206
ciarannolan wrote: post #8

I feel like the good faith presumption for this company has to have shifted by now. Is there any reason not to assume that the Chinese government is surveilling Zoom calls en masse? Documenting participants (face, voice, language, location, etc.), recording content, etc. We're talking about the data of 200M+ users. I see people on HN defending Zoom all the time. >The company has acknowledged that much of its product…

>The government of Taiwan banned official use of Zoom due to security concerns, as have New York State schools, the U.S. Senate, and the German ministry of foreign affairs. This is good enough reason to not use it. Also I stopped using zoom and trying to avoiding it as much as possible after the very first vulnerability scandal[0] came about [0] https://medium.com/bugbountywriteup/zoom-zero-day-4-million-...

Is there a non-Zoom client that can connect to Zoom meetings? My company implemented RingCentral about a year ago, which appears to just use a rebranded Zoom architecture for the online meeting component. They're not going to get rid of it anytime soon.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#530

Post by thePunisher »

OTOH I find it incomprehensible that the Tienanmen Square student leaders would risk holding an online meeting through a Chinese controlled video messaging platform.

I mean, there are loads of other options. Why would they choose Zoom, knowing that it's being controlled (directly or indirectly) by China?

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