Zoom is a popular video conferencing platform that enables remote work and collaboration. However, Zoom security is a significant concern for its users, as the platform collects and shares personal data with third-party services and allows unauthorized access to meetings and recordings.
With the global shift towards remote work, Zoom has become a crucial platform for virtual meetings, presentations, and collaboration. The sensitive nature of discussions and information shared during Zoom sessions underscores the critical need for robust security measures. Breaches or leaks can have severe consequences for businesses, ranging from compromised intellectual property to regulatory non-compliance.
In 2020, Zoom exposed over 500,000 user accounts and passwords to hackers, who sold them on the dark web or used them to disrupt meetings in a practice called "Zoombombing." This resulted in financial, operational, compliance, and reputational damages for Zoom and its customers, who lost sensitive information, faced legal penalties, and suffered negative publicity.
Therefore, it’s crucial to secure Zoom data and recordings using strong passwords, encryption, authentication, and other security features to protect online communications' confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
So, how secure is Zoom?
Zoom is a widely used video conferencing platform that facilitates remote work and collaboration. However, the platform also faces several Zoom security issues that could compromise the privacy and safety of its users. Some of the main challenges are:
Zoom meetings can be disrupted by uninvited guests who join the meeting using leaked or guessed links and passwords. This practice, known as “Zoombombing,” can cause harassment, distraction, and data theft.
Zoom collects and shares user data with third-party services, such as Facebook, without obtaining explicit consent from the users. This could expose personal information, such as names, email addresses, device details, and location data, to potential misuse and abuse.
Zoom passwords are not secure enough to prevent brute-force attacks or credential stuffing. Hackers can obtain Zoom passwords from the dark web or other sources to access Zoom accounts and meetings.
Zoom users may not know the security settings and features or how to use them effectively. Zoom hosts may not have enough control over the participants and their actions, such as screen sharing, file transfer, or private chat.
Zoom, acknowledging the paramount importance of security, provides several built-in features to address potential threats. These include the Waiting Room feature, strong password recommendations, end-to-end encryption, and customizable security settings.
Zoom users should follow some best practices for securing their Zoom meetings, such as:
While these features form the security foundation of Zoom, it's essential to recognize that they may not comprehensively address the evolving landscape of security challenges.
Hence, grasping the intricacies of these built-in security measures becomes a gateway to delving into advanced strategies and practices aimed at fortifying Zoom security. Let's now explore how organizations can strengthen their defenses and adeptly navigate the ever-evolving landscape of Zoom security challenges.
To enhance Zoom security, organizations should focus on the following aspects:
Gain a comprehensive and holistic view of Zoom usage, performance, and security across the organization. Use dashboards, reports, and alerts to monitor and analyze Zoom data and metrics.
Protect Zoom meetings and recordings with robust and unique passwords. Use password generators, managers, and validators to create and store secure passwords. Avoid sharing passwords publicly or with untrusted parties.
Users should employ password generators, managers, and validators to securely create and store strong and unique passwords. By adhering to password policies and standards, including expiration, complexity, and history rules, organizations can enforce the regular change of passwords, minimizing the risk of compromise and ensuring a higher level of security for Zoom interactions.
Control and limit the access and sharing of Zoom data, such as recordings, transcripts, chat messages, and files. Use encryption, permissions, and classifications to safeguard sensitive or confidential data. Delete or archive data that is no longer needed or relevant.
There are various Zoom security concerns and risks, such as unauthorized access, data breaches, and privacy violations. Therefore, it’s essential to follow some best practices for Zoom security, such as:
DoControl is a SaaS security platform that helps organizations protect their data and assets in Zoom and other cloud applications.
DoControl ensures SaaS data security with its comprehensive solution, offering visibility, threat detection, and remediation tailored for significant ecosystems, including Google Drive and Microsoft SharePoint. Employing automated workflows and end-user engagement, DoControl swiftly addresses risks, ensuring robust security with minimal effort. Unlike traditional approaches, it integrates business context, delivering real-time threat detection and accurate risk prioritization.
DoControl provides a unified data inventory of Zoom assets and users, giving organizations a comprehensive and granular view of their Zoom data and usage. This includes detailed dashboards, reports, and alerts that provide a holistic view of Zoom data and metrics, empowering administrators to monitor and analyze Zoom usage seamlessly.
Its Context-Based Alerts and Activity Monitoring features enhance the ability to track and audit Zoom users' and hosts' activities and behaviors. Through logs, analytics, and notifications, organizations can detect and prevent suspicious, malicious, or inappropriate actions or events on Zoom.
This addresses the challenge of lacking visibility into potential risks and ensures that security teams receive real-time alerts on risky activities related to Zoom data, reducing false positives and alert fatigue.
Leveraging cutting-edge security measures, DoControl ensures that only authorized personnel can access critical information, safeguarding against potential data breaches and unauthorized exposure. The platform enables organizations to enforce granular access controls, defining and managing permissions based on roles and responsibilities.
With a keen focus on risk mitigation, DoControl provides real-time visibility into user activities, allowing security teams to promptly identify and remediate suspicious or unauthorized access attempts.
With DoControl, administrators can establish and enforce policies that dictate who can access, modify, or share specific data types, reducing the risk of overexposure and data breaches. The platform provides a fine-grained level of visibility into user interactions with sensitive information, allowing security teams to monitor and audit data access in real time.
DoControl controls and limits the access and sharing of Zoom data, such as recordings, transcripts, chat messages, and files, using encryption, permissions, and classifications to safeguard sensitive or confidential data. DoControl also uses NLP to scan and classify Zoom data for PII, PCI, and PHI and applies data loss prevention policies to block, alert, or quarantine any data that violates the rules or thresholds.
The platform also automates identifying and remediating data exposure and risk and enforces security workflows to streamline and coordinate security tasks and operations on Zoom.
As remote collaboration becomes integral to the modern workplace, the commitment to security will play a crucial role in shaping a future where organizations can collaborate seamlessly without compromising sensitive information.
Organizations can create a robust Zoom security environment by understanding the challenges and implementing best practices. Leveraging advanced solutions can provide a comprehensive and automated approach to address key pain points, ensuring a secure and collaborative future.
Encourage a proactive approach to Zoom security, emphasizing the importance of ongoing education, regular audits, and adopting advanced security solutions to stay ahead of evolving threats.
Zoom security is the set of features and policies that Zoom uses to protect the privacy and integrity of your meetings, data, and communications. It’s essential due to the sensitive nature of discussions and information shared during virtual meetings, which, if compromised, can lead to severe consequences for businesses and individuals. Zoom security helps you prevent and respond to potential disruptions, threats, and breaches that could compromise your information or disrupt your events.
The main Zoom security concerns include:
The best practices for Zoom security involve:
Some of the common types of Zoom data and recordings that need to be secured are:
Protecting this data is essential to prevent unauthorized access, leakage, and potential breaches.
Research-based benchmarks to assess risk across critical threat model
Discover why sensitive data discovery tools often trigger false alarms, causing frustration for InfoSec teams. Learn why this happens and how to find tools for accurate detections.
Learn about the three primary types of Zoom vulnerabilities: in-meeting, data storage, and system access risks. Safeguard your organization effectively against these threats.
SaaS solutions are integral for workflows, granting anytime access to critical data. Yet, without robust SaaS Access Control Management, businesses face significant security risks.