The use of the American Video conferencing app Zoom has suddenly spiked up amid the Coronavirus outbreak. Zoom has become the go-to app for people working from home. But before you install it, get to know all about the Pros and cons of Zoom.
But how much do you really know about it? Before you use something, it’s important to know whether it’s worth it or not. Here we will tell you how it became so popular and all the pros and cons of Zoom you must know.
Research is important – and so we have done the required research for you. Just read through it all and know what you must.
About Zoom
Zoom is one of the leading video conferencing software apps in the market. It is a cloud-based service that you can use to conduct virtual meetings with others. You can start or join a Zoom meeting without signing in or needing a password.
It uses both video and audio modes of conducting live chats and you can record those sessions for later review.
Zoom is very helpful in conducting large scale virtual meetings which makes it ideal for business and school-related works.
The Zoom app for Mac, Windows, Android and iOS is available for download. Desktop has more features than Android or iOS.
Who uses Zoom
Earlier it was mostly the business world that made the most of this app, but recently, it’s exploded everywhere. Along with 700,000 business customers, Zoom also boasts of a customer base of 6,900 educational institutions.
From 3 million people in 2013 to 100 million people in 2015, Zoom participation has definitely tasted the success. As of now, Zoom sees an average of 1 million meeting participants every day!
Do you see those surprising numbers? The went on becoming 30 times popular each coming year! It was already growing too fast before Coronavirus pandemic made it even more popular.
And according to Zoom, the daily users have gone from 10 million in December 2019 to 200 million in March 2020! Yes, take your time to digest those numbers.
Pros – what made it so popular?
Okay, so there are a million other options out there, then why Zoom? What made people choose Zoom over other similar apps? In one word – convenience.
Zoom is a product made for user satisfaction – that’s the founding ground of the company. Their product is completely customer-driven and that’s why it can sell itself. They improved on the feedback they got from their customers.
Zoom has made it easier to conduct a virtual meeting without having to fumble with several other apps for different things. It does not only provide video conferencing or audio conferencing or screen-sharing. It has all of these features in one place which prevents a lot of hustle.
Doesn’t it get really frustrating to remember a new password and ID for each new app that you have to use these days? That’s another issue that Zoom has resolved. You don’t need a log-in ID or a password to use Zoom.
The quality of video calling on Zoom has been hailed for being buffer-free and HD. Now users don’t have to be worried whether they can be heard on the other side or not.
Conference calls are smooth where more than ten people can participate without loss of quality. Apart from that screen-sharing and scheduling is way more convenient than other apps.
So these are the pros of using this app. Now let’s have a look at the cons…
Cons – is it really safe?
Although Zoom is definitely becoming more and more famous each day, many journalists and researchers have found many risks associated with the app.
And it is now coming to the attention of more and more people that after Facebook, this free app might come at the risk of giving up your personal data.
In the past few weeks, Zoom has been under scrutiny for its unclear privacy policies and data leaks. As it turns out, Zoom doesn’t use end-to-end encryption as claimed earlier.
A spokesperson of Zoom wrote, “Currently, it is not possible to enable E2E encryption for Zoom video meetings. Zoom video meetings use a combination of TCP and UDP. TCP connections are made using TLS and UDP connections are encrypted with AES using a key negotiated over a TLS connection.”
Zoombombing
On top of its other security issues stands “Zoombombing”. Zoombombing happens when uninvited individuals can intrude any video conferencing and cause disruption.
Zoom has made it easier to log into video meetings but it has also made it easier for the trolls ‘bomb’ the meetings.
There have been several incidents of such hacking or ‘bombing’ of Zoom meetings. These hackers or Zoombombers often post racial slurs or pornographic content in meetings.
Zoombombing is a serious problem in the USA where most colleges have shifted to online mode of conducting classes.
And the cause of Zoombombing is the very convenience of use for which it is famous.
Any host holding the meeting has to share one link to all the participants. Anyone can join the meeting merely by clicking on that link. So that makes it really easy for the trolls to bomb the meeting by merely clicking on that link.
So do you think a password can help? Maybe not that much. What if any participant secretly shares the password with another person?
What has been the company’s response?
Now that we know about the major pros and cons of the Video Conferencing app Zoom, let’s have a look at the response of the company.
Zoom has already taken some measures to prevent the Zoombombing by turning on password by default for all its front tier users.
And as far as privacy policy goes, CEO of Zoom has responded to that as well. In a blog post on Wednesday, he apologised for the privacy violations.
He wrote, “We recognise that we have fallen short of the community’s – and our own – privacy and security expectations. For that, I am deeply sorry and I want to share what we are doing about it.”
Apart from that, the company shared its protective features in a blog post on how to prevent Zoombombing.
The company has also updated its privacy policy to promote clarity and transparency on the data it collects. Zoom also assured users that it never sells user data and doesn’t plan to do so in future.
So what do you think, are these measures enough? Only time will tell.
For now, all we know is that Zoom is the most popular and most convenient app in use and not going anywhere soon. It was important for you to know all the pros and cons of Zoom.
So stay safe with its use and let’s hope for the best.
Until next time!
