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Comment by digitalboss | Hacker News Reader

via Zoom Support Reply: https://twitter.com/zoom_us/status/1241768006327336963

"Hi, attention tracking feature is off by default - once enabled, hosts can tell if participants have the App open and active when the screen-sharing feature is in use. It does not track any aspects of your audio/video or other applications on your window."

Points to this article: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/115000538083-Atten...

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The twitter thread in the OP says "collects data on the programs running" without backing anything up. Seems like FUD from the face of it. Yes, the privacy may not be perfect (according to EFF admins can see time spent by others in the organization on meetings etc.), and zoom can notify the meeting organizer about participants not having the window in focus. But that's it?

Not exactly the gravity touted in the linked twitter thread, saying "If you manage the calls, you can monitor what programs users on the call are running as well". No proof of that...

Kinda scared by how much a single tweet can make something blow up, without a shred of evidence backing the claims up.

The more interesting aspect to me from the EFF article was that admins can also see your geolocation, who you are meeting with and when, etc. Basically, if Zoom is your platform for communicating, your Zoom admin knows a LOT of metadata about your people that they might not be aware is knowable.

is the feature to be enabled by the host? Or by each individual participant?

All of which doesn’t say whether it’s the host or the attendee that gets to determine whether this feature is on or off.

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