Zoom denies recording users without their consent, silently updates its terms of service

Zoom was accused of using its customers’ faces to train its AI bot, without informing its customers, or asking them for consent. For this, the company faced some severe backlash.

Zoom has since then denied the allegations that they had never done what was being alleged and that they will take permissions as and when required. However, since then, Zoom has quietly updated its term of usage and conditions.

In response to concerns from users about potential AI training, Zoom clarified in a blog post that audio, video, and chat content would not be utilized for AI purposes without user consent. This action was taken after users noticed changes in the company’s terms of service in March, which led to concerns regarding AI training.

The changes in terms were made with the intention of increasing transparency. Zoom introduced AI-powered features in June that allowed clients to summarize meetings without recording the entire session. Although offered as a free trial, some experts warned that the original wording of the terms could potentially grant Zoom access to more user data than necessary, including data from customer calls.

Data protection specialist Robert Bateman expressed concern over the broad contractual provisions in the original terms and their potential risks. Zoom later updated its terms to explicitly state that customer content, including audio, video, and chat data, would not be used to train AI models without user consent.

The use of AI in applications involves the training of models using extensive data to replicate human-like behaviour. However, concerns about extracting online information to train AI models have raised worries about including personal, sensitive, or copyrighted material in their datasets.

The Open Rights Group, a digital privacy advocate, raised concerns about Zoom’s handling of the situation, particularly regarding the “opt-in” approach to AI features during a free trial. While Zoom stated that customers would be asked for consent to use their data for AI training, concerns about transparency and privacy policy remained.

Zoom spokespersons emphasized that users can decide whether to enable AI features and whether to share content with Zoom for product improvement. The company’s Chief Product Officer, Smita Hashim, explained that account owners and administrators could choose to turn on AI features, and users who did so would be presented with a transparent consent process for AI model training using customer content.

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