Zoom's iOS App Accused Of Transmitting User Data To Facebook

Anil - Mar 29, 2020

Even when we don’t have a Facebook account at all.

Due to the spread of the coronavirus, video conferencing service Zoom has become more popular than ever. However, it is having trouble with its vague privacy policy which the iOS version of the Zoom app sends users’ private data to Facebook, even when they don’t have a Facebook account.

zoom 1 — Leaked data includes several types of information.

As reported by Motherboard, the data that is being sent to Facebook includes usage information, for example when the user opens the app, details of user’s phone model, their address’s time zone, their connecting location, what they used to connect to, and an advertiser identifier that advertisers can use to send ads to their targeted customers.

Because the app developers have created their products relied on Facebook’s software development kits (SDKs), to some extent, they are ready to share the data with the platform. Basically, it is a bargain when developers use SDKs to make their apps more practical in use and Facebook enjoys some information as a profit from that process. Regarding Zoom, however, iOS users have not been informed about this transaction.

zoom 2 — The information is extracted via cookies and tracking technologies.

According to Zoom’s official privacy policy, their third-party service provider and advertising companions such as Google Ads and Google Analytics are autonomously collecting some users’ data when using their products. The information is extracted via cookies and tracking technologies.

However, Zoom’s trade-off with Facebook is not mentioned here, and the information sent to their third-party affiliates are thought to be precious, which includes IP addresses, browser type, the Internet service provider (ISP), referrer URL, exit pages, the files viewed on-site, operating system, date/time stamp, and clickstream data.

The real problem here is Zoom’s not announcing this practice to its users. If they did, they would not do it in a very obvious way. In addition, Motherboard also provided that Facebook had been clear in their terms for developers using their SDKs, which they need to be transparent with their users about the data being extracted by Facebook.

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