Zoom, a video conferencing app that many people are using at the current time to keep in touch with coworkers while working from home, was sending data to Facebook without disclosing the data sharing to customers.
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As of today, Zoom has updated its iOS app to remove the SDK that was providing data to Facebook through the Login with Facebook feature, according to Motherboard, the site that first discovered Zoom's data sharing practices.
Zoom was providing Facebook with data that included when a user opened the app, plus their timezone, city, and device details. Zoom's privacy policy did not make it clear that the data was shared with Facebook.
In a statement, a spokesperson for Zoom said that Zoom was unaware that the Facebook SDK was collecting unnecessary device data.
"Zoom takes its users' privacy extremely seriously. We originally implemented the 'Login with Facebook' feature using the Facebook SDK in order to provide our users with another convenient way to access our platform. However, we were recently made aware that the Facebook SDK was collecting unnecessary device data."
"The data collected by the Facebook SDK did not include any personal user information, but rather included data about users' devices such as the mobile OS type and version, the device time zone, device OS, device model and carrier, screen size, processor cores, and disk space."
"We will be removing the Facebook SDK and reconfiguring the feature so that users will still be able to login with Facebook via their browser. Users will need to update to the latest version of our application once it becomes available in order for these changes to take hold, and we encourage them to do so. We sincerely apologize for this oversight, and remain firmly committed to the protection of our users' data."
Motherboard has since verified that the iOS app is no longer sending data to Facebook when it is opened.
Top Rated Comments
(View all)Privacy is key, customers are paying more and more attention to their rights, and they will reject apps that don't offer alternative services to log in.
People like you deserve immense success.As an iOS developer, I will never use anything Facebook-related ever again in my apps. No SDKs, no libraries made by them, and certainly no integrations with any of their products unless it's a simple "share this content with Instagram/Whatsapp" prompt.
Privacy is key, customers are paying more and more attention to their rights, and they will reject apps that don't offer alternative services to log in.
Every time a developer gets caught sharing data they shouldn’t, they always lead off their apology with this. To which I say, well, no you don’t or else we wouldn’t be having this conversation.