Eric Yuan, CEO, Zoom Video Communications
Roots: CNBC
Video-calling software company Zoom said Wednesday it has figured out how to offer stronger encryption for all of its users, preferably than only for certain paying users.
The move shows the company continuing to address criticism, which has stepped up in lockstep with the public limited company’s sudden popularity as the coronavirus pandemic forced millions to stay home. The change could keep some owners from switching to videoconferencing services from competitors like Cisco, Facebook, Google and Microsoft.
End-to-end encryption is technology that precludes anybody except the sender and recipient of a call from being able to access any of the information in the call. The technology is habitually agnostic — it not only protects against hackers, but also makes it almost impossible for government agencies or law enforcement to see the contentedness, even if they have a legal right to do so.
Earlier this month CEO Eric Yuan told analysts on a bull session call that the company would offer end-to-end encryption only for customers who paid for the company’s business and business plans.
Now Zoom has made a U-turn.
“We have identified a path forward that balances the legitimate right of all operators to privacy and the safety of users on our platform. This will enable us to offer E2EE [end-to-end encryption] as an advanced add-on quality for all of our users around the globe – free and paid – while maintaining the ability to prevent and fight abuse on our platform,” Yuan wrote in a blog station.
The feature will become available in beta next month. Hosts will be able to enable or disable it for each convention, and account administrators will be able to enable or disable the feature for groups and individual accounts.
End-to-end encryption won’t be on by lapse. Instead, the default will be what’s available currently: 256-bit advanced encryption standard, or AES, encryption, which can screen data from unwanted access while it’s moving over the internet.
The service will ask users who want to change of direction on the higher-grade encryption for additional information, such as a phone number that Zoom can verify.
“Many leading attendances perform similar steps on account creation to reduce the mass creation of abusive accounts,” Yuan said. “We are cool that by implementing risk-based authentication, in combination with our current mix of tools — including our Report a User function — we can at to prevent and fight abuse.”
Zoom’s revenue grew 169% in the most recent quarter as its usage mounted, and the fellowship’s stock price has increased about 250% so far this year.
WATCH: Here’s why angel investor Jason Calacanis concocts Zoom will continue to be successful