Zoom under fire for AI policy change

Zoom is committed to transparency and user control. Read our blog post below for "How Zoom’s terms of service and practices apply to AI features". We have included details and visuals on the consent and controls that are part of our generative AI feature free trials - Zoom IQ Meeting Summary and Zoom IQ Team Chat Compose to make sure you are well informed.

?? Zoom probably won't be the last company to face backlash over terms of service that seem to give it broad permission to use your data to train its AI products. The company has since clarified that it will not use customer audio, video, or chat data to train AI "without consent," but what does that mean? It's hard to say because TOS language is super confusing, and maybe that's the point. While human privacy lawyers spin their wheels trying to figure all these terms of service out, AI systems are being trained en masse. And you can't un-train them. Is this part of the tech industry's "better to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission" ethos? Our news story ??

I have three main observations from this: 1. We're all going to have to address AI in rights agreements, terms of service, and similar documents and instruments - probably sooner rather than later. Given AI's current prominence, Zoom's attorneys were justified in wanting to cover it in the TOS (and probably viewed it as a clarification more than a material change). 2. As we are seeing from the current guild negotiations, attorneys (and companies) are going to have to become much more fluent with the technology and the vernacular around AI, so we can be more explicit and specific as to how AI will (and will not) be used in connection with certain rights and data. We need to move from generalities and blanket provisions to specificities. 3. At the present time, when it comes to AI, I don't think it's possible to divorce legal issues from issues of public relations and public perception. This Zoom TOS update was almost certainly an innocuous, common sense and necessary update - but has led to a storm in a teacup due to it being picked up and nefarious motives being imputed. I'd say that any company (including any movie or TV studio) seeking to update its TOS or standard form contract to cover AI might want to consult with PR as well as legal - and probably communicate the change to users preemptively. https://lnkd.in/g6i8CEDc

Worried about the latest updates in the Zoom Terms of Service and what it means for your content? Here's how I read it -- and why it may need another revision by Zoom. #zoom #data #privacy #ai #llm #saas

Yes, you read that correctly - your private conversations are now the property of Zoom's AI data training set.?Thomas Meloche Mike Russell

Have you had a chance to review Zoom's updated terms of service? ?? The use of customer-generated data for AI training without an opt-out option and the broad redistribution rights are sparking critical conversations. This contributes to the growing debate surrounding user privacy and ethics in the tech sector. How do you see these implications shaping the future of user privacy and responsible use of data? #data #ai #dataprivacy #techethics

Zoom users, this is precisely the type of security and privacy issue we have to avoid when using AI. Protect yourselves, your company.

Under section 10.4 of the updated terms, Zoom holds a "perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicensable, and transferable license" to redistribute, publish, access, use, store, transmit, review, disclose, preserve, extract, modify, reproduce, share, use, display, copy, distribute, translate, transcribe, create derivative works, and process Customer Content. I want to understand why I would pay Zoom to use their platform while they’re mining my meetings and events for content that they can reproduce and use in whatever way they want to in perpetuity. We’ve reached a level of consumerism in our society where anything and everything can be packaged and sold for a profit - including that which makes us individual, unique, singular, who we are. Some might find the alarms being sounded around the ethical and consent-centered use of AI to be unnecessary, but we are witnessing the turn of our digital age. We shouldn’t leave how this technology is produced and for whom up to chance. History has taught us that when we leave technological decision making to those who joke the most power and privilege in our society only - it always goes wrong. Not sometimes. Not every now and then. By it always produces a detrimental outcome for those who have been forced to the margins in our world. Looking to learn more about what happens when justice and ethics are ripped from from critical conversations about artifical intelligence? Download the MMG EARTH AI x Racial Justice Toolkit at the link in the comments.

Zoom recently changed its terms of service to allow the company to use user data to train AI models. There is no opt-out for paid customers, not even for doctors, therapists, lawyers, or others who routinely need to discuss confidential matters. I've had a paid subscription for six years; I just canceled it, and I recommend that you and your employer cancel yours until Zoom backs down. (https://whereby.com/ is a viable alternative: they're governed by Norwegian law, which gives some teeth to data privacy.)