Zoom - recent security vulnerabilities, exploits in wild

Forums › IT Pro and developers › Zoom - recent security vulnerabilities, exploits in wild

1 | 2 | 3

7345 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 2117

ID Verified

#2454004 3-Apr-2020 18:09

WFH has caused an explosion of teams in the (more MS dependant) biz world.

Skype for business can't cut the same integration or group capabilities. We're on daily, some from phones, some via teams web, some via teams client. Just.. works.

Would not be surprised if unification shifts to it and Skype drops off the radar as many suggest.

You can add off-site/prem clients to have meetings with you and so on now too. And apparently working with BJ for cross platform connect.

TwoSeven

1712 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 304

Subscriber

#2454012 3-Apr-2020 18:17

Most people I know use teams in the business space. Outside of that it seems to be skype for desktop (or mobile) - for some people it seems to be difficult to set up - never understood why. However, its one of those things that most people seem to know how to use.

Zoom is not something that I would consider because of its history with poor security.

Software Engineer
(the practice of real science, engineering and management)
A.I. (Automation rebranded)
Gender Neutral
(a person who believes in equality and who does not believe in/use stereotypes. Examples such as gender, binary, nonbinary, male/female etc.)

...they/their/them...

BlakJak

1330 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 735

Trusted

#2454055 3-Apr-2020 20:00

mattwnz:

Personally I don't know anyone that works, who doesn't have an ipad, or an iphone, or an ipod, even an older generation one, or their children has one, that could use facetime. AT least for personal use. In terms of tablets, ipads are the gold standard for the lower cost consumption tablet, and reasonably cheap, and apple doesn't really have a competitor in that market, as android tablets are now not really much of a thing, due to the lack of proper tablet apps for it..

Still very skewed. There isn't a single Apple product in my household.

Four of us in my household, probably nearly 20 computing devices of various breeds, none of them by Apple. Desktops, Laptops, Tablets, Mobile phones... all Windows, Linux or Android.

How can you define an iPad as the gold standard for a lower cost tablet, when you can buy Android tablets for less than $100?
You can also buy quite expensive Samsung tablets which are quite capable. Certainly it's not just an Apple world, and you could never use Apple and lower-cost in the same sentence.

Stop drinking the iCool-Aid, man...

No signature to see here, move along...

BlakJak

1330 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 735

Trusted

#2454056 3-Apr-2020 20:00

Btw since when is 2 levels of quotes, too many? :o

No signature to see here, move along...

RunningMan

9186 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 4840

#2454060 3-Apr-2020 20:15

BlakJak:

Btw since when is 2 levels of quotes, too many? :o

It's always been too many ;-)

I think it was auto limited a couple of weeks back though.

antonknee

1133 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1145

#2454100 3-Apr-2020 22:12

Teams all the way... our organisation also uses Cisco WebEx and what a nightmare that platform is. In fairness when it works, it works well - unfortunately it’s very very hit or miss in my experience, and particularly lately.

New World

Shop on-line at New World now for your groceries (affiliate link).

Cybnate

76 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 28

#2454101 3-Apr-2020 22:13

For the geeks you can install your own open source videocall platform with Jitsi. Safer than Zoom and scalable.
Will need to have experience with installing services on a server behind a NAT though.

Here is a starting point: https://github.com/jitsi/jitsi-meet/blob/master/doc/quick-install.md

You can also test it on their platform, less secure, less performance but works fine for small user groups: https://jitsi.org/jitsi-meet/

Dial111

979 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 656

#2454113 3-Apr-2020 23:08

BlakJak:
mattwnz:

Personally I don't know anyone that works, who doesn't have an ipad, or an iphone, or an ipod, even an older generation one, or their children has one, that could use facetime. AT least for personal use. In terms of tablets, ipads are the gold standard for the lower cost consumption tablet, and reasonably cheap, and apple doesn't really have a competitor in that market, as android tablets are now not really much of a thing, due to the lack of proper tablet apps for it..

Still very skewed. There isn't a single Apple product in my household.

Four of us in my household, probably nearly 20 computing devices of various breeds, none of them by Apple. Desktops, Laptops, Tablets, Mobile phones... all Windows, Linux or Android.

How can you define an iPad as the gold standard for a lower cost tablet, when you can buy Android tablets for less than $100?
You can also buy quite expensive Samsung tablets which are quite capable. Certainly it's not just an Apple world, and you could never use Apple and lower-cost in the same sentence.

Stop drinking the iCool-Aid, man...

In all fairness the “iPad” is basically unrivalled by any other Android tablet on the market and that would include the Tab S6. As for sub $100 android tablets - nothing but junk.

Topic is getting sidetracked though

Handle9

11925 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9675

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2454156 4-Apr-2020 08:24

mattwnz:
Skype can be a bit of a hassle. But most people who work seem to have an ios device, whether it is an ipad or iphone or ipod, and facetime is free for as long as you want to use. it

FaceTime is a proprietary C2C video calling solution.

Businesses use Laptop/Desktop solutions that cover screen sharing, multiple platforms, AD support and file sharing.

Working in a power point on an iPhone? No thanks!

Skype for Business, Teams, Zoom etc cover business functionality. Admittedly they don't let you do nice Emojis.

Handle9

11925 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9675

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2454160 4-Apr-2020 08:33

BlakJak:
mattwnz:

Personally I don't know anyone that works, who doesn't have an ipad, or an iphone, or an ipod, even an older generation one, or their children has one, that could use facetime. AT least for personal use. In terms of tablets, ipads are the gold standard for the lower cost consumption tablet, and reasonably cheap, and apple doesn't really have a competitor in that market, as android tablets are now not really much of a thing, due to the lack of proper tablet apps for it..

Still very skewed. There isn't a single Apple product in my household.

Four of us in my household, probably nearly 20 computing devices of various breeds, none of them by Apple. Desktops, Laptops, Tablets, Mobile phones... all Windows, Linux or Android.

How can you define an iPad as the gold standard for a lower cost tablet, when you can buy Android tablets for less than $100?
You can also buy quite expensive Samsung tablets which are quite capable. Certainly it's not just an Apple world, and you could never use Apple and lower-cost in the same sentence.

Stop drinking the iCool-Aid, man...

The iPad ecosystem is by far the gold standard for tablets. That is true from any objective measurement - Google have given up and the only other company really trying is Microsoft. Apple has over 35% market share, even with all the cheap junk out there A Surface Pro is my daily driver, I use a OnePlus phone and an iPad. I use what is best for me I don't buy on brand. There are plenty of consumers who reject Apple based on brand which in my opinion is silly.

Saying the iPad is the best tablet experience (by a fair margin) is factual but FaceTime is irrelevant in the enterprise.

BlakJak

1330 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 735

Trusted

#2454173 4-Apr-2020 09:02

iPads are great tablets. But low cost? No way.

Our tablet was used for lite gaming, browsing and the likes of youtube, as well as some media watching, all worked fine... did not need to spend $1000 for that use-case.

And my original point really was, that generalized statements about how Apple products solve every problem are wrong... they're expensive
(Great if you can afford them) and not the be-all.

In corporate environments where staff are given the choice between Andeoid and Apple devices I've seen an even split between them.

So let's focus on options available for both?

No signature to see here, move along...

Lego

Shop now for Lego sets and other gifts (affiliate link).

gzt

18684 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 7824

Lifetime subscriber

#2454179 4-Apr-2020 09:19

In usability, zoom is a great product. Otherwise..
- immature in the security and privacy area
- claims to provide end-to-end encryption when it does not

CokemonZ

1106 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 313

#2454181 4-Apr-2020 09:33

Teams is great for inhouse 'video calls' which can be small video conferences.

But Zoom is a dedicated tool and gives you way more control than teams does.

The ability to mute AND UNMUTE, spotlight individuals and a bunch of other stuff makes Zoom a much superior single purpose tool than Teams.

That said, 90% of our meetings take place in teams, and about 10% in Zoom because most of the time we just don't need the extra features.

Technofreak

6657 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 3477

Trusted

#2454186 4-Apr-2020 09:41

Teams and the like is great for established work groups but for one off video meetings, say a job interview, products like Zoom come into their own. They're super simple to get the other party set up, no need to install an app, send a link and it "just works". No wonder Zoom is so popular.

As for the iPad V other tablets argument. I know my S3 will run a fairly large spreadsheet we use for work but all the iPads I've seen try to run it, cannot. Horses for courses. The S pen has some pretty neat features, especially the smart select feature, some of which I believe may not be available with the Apple pencil, however I may be wrong about that. It depends on what feature/function you consider important as to which tablet is the best.

Sony Xperia XA2 running Sailfish OS. https://sailfishos.org The true independent open source mobile OS
Samsung Galaxy Tab S6
Dell Inspiron 14z i5

BlinkyBill

1443 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1100
Inactive user

#2454202 4-Apr-2020 10:13

Here is a great description of the issues Zoom is having, and the efforts they are going to to remediate those issues. Written by an expert, and based on reverse-engineering of the Zoom software, as well as an analysis of Zoom’s t’s-and-c’s.

https://blog.cryptographyengineering.com/2020/04/03/does-zoom-use-end-to-end-encryption/

Functionally, Zoom is great, but you need to understand it’s frailties.

1 | 2 | 3