Google has banned the use of the Zoom platform for its employees, and the company cites security concerns that emerged after the platform became one of the most popular free video chat services during the emerging Corona virus pandemic, and the ban applies to all workers across the global Google team. The search giant sent an email to employees last week about the ban, telling employees who use Zoom on their devices provided by Google that the program will not work soon.
It should be noted that Google offers a competing service to Zoom called Meet as part of its productivity suite (G Suite). Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said: “Google has always followed a policy of not allowing employees to use unapproved applications to work outside the company network.” He added, “Our security team informed employees who use Zoom for computers that it will no longer work on company computers because it does not meet our security standards for the applications used by our employees. Employees who were using Zoom to stay in touch with family can continue to use it through a web browser or via mobile phone.”
The platform was facing criticism for lax privacy and security protections even before the new Corona virus highlighted its weaknesses, and Zoom has witnessed a significant increase in the level of scrutiny in recent weeks after the number of its users rose from 10 million to 200 million in the past three months due to the rise in the number of people working from home around the world.
The video conferencing service has faced backlash after reports emerged of traffic being transmitted through China, a lack of proper security and encryption measures and other privacy-related issues such as the ability of hackers to eavesdrop on calls, meeting records available to the public online, and non-meeting attendees being able to hijack calls.
Zoom announced earlier this week that it had appointed former Facebook security official Alex Stamos as a safety and privacy advisor after a number of prominent problems. Among the other institutions that have banned the use of Zoom so far are the German Foreign Ministry and the entire Taiwanese government. Arab Technical News Portal: Google prevents its employees from using Zoom.
