Risks Involved In Video Calling | Especially Using Zoom And Houseparty

Amidst of Corona Virus or COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown, the demand of Zoom and Houseparty exploded in a short period. Many professionals are shifting their focus on Zoom for business meetings, and meanwhile, Houseparty making it big in people’s personal life.

What is Zoom & Houseparty?

First, let’s understand the concept of the solutions and what it does.

Zoom: Zoom Client is designed for Windows, Outlook, IBM Notes, and more. Zoom is for professional people, who cannot attend the meetings physically, and they can create a schedule, and conduct meetings virtually.

Houseparty: Houseparty is a cross-platform solution and concept is a straightforward face-to-face social network. In this application, you can make video calls to one recipient or a group. You don’t even have to provide phone number because this is a face-to-face social networking platform.

I want to confirm the readers that Zoom and Houseparty are two different applications and do not have any relation between them. The news broke out separately and they are mentioned in the same news articles because of popularity timing and similar privacy concerns.

What’s the controversy about?

Privacy!

The privacy concerns started, when the New Zealand Parliament is holding Epidemic Response Committee meetings using the official Vimeo account and using Zoom to host the meetings. The politicians, who attended the pandemic meetings, are likely to use the Zoom application, which has opened a new dimension of malicious activity.

The FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) started to investigate the matter when multiple reports started to emerge those video-teleconferencing (VTC) solutions of malicious activity. The FBI officials issued a warning to the company, and that’s when everything started to come into one place.

Houseparty Response

Many active users came forward with snapshots alleging that Houseparty could have a loophole, which was the reason behind the lockdown of popular applications such as Spotify, Netflix, Online banking, and more. However, I want to make it clear that there is no substantial proof regarding the matter.

Houseparty is owned by Epic Games.

Epic Games is the same company that owns Fortnite, Watch Dogs, World War Z, and more games. The company announced that they recognize the rumors spreading across social media platforms. The authorities believe that this is a professional campaign led by rival parties and offering USD 1 million to anyone, who brings valid proof on the table.

On the official Houseparty Twitter Account: “We are investigating indications that the recent hacking rumors were spread by a paid commercial smear campaign to harm Houseparty. We are offering a $1,000,000 bounty for the first individual to provide proof of such a campaign to bounty@houseparty.com.”

On the same Twitter thread, I have seen many replies from the existing users or at least they are claiming to be.

Users did provide snapshots of the app usage statistics of Houseparty in the same thread.

Meanwhile, Forbes investigation claims that there are no security flaws and they had cybersecurity and privacy researcher Luka Stefanko investigates the matter. Overall, Stefanko made it clear that there are no security loopholes or permissions that misusing registered user’s privacy.

Zoom

Unfortunately, I could not find any response from the Zoom, but I have some spicy news that might change your opinion on the product. Zoom secretly installs web server in iMac or MacBook, which is not removable despite uninstalling the original program.

1. Apple’s official team had to come forward to secure MacBook and iMac. The researcher Jonathan Leitschuh pointed out the loophole that allows the secret webserver to turn on webcam without administrator consent.
2. Did you know that the FBI warned Zoom users to adjust default settings? Unfortunately, Zoom’s poor default settings could allow unprotected meetings to take over screen-sharing and display anything on the screen.
3. Zoom secretly started to share users’ data with social media giant Facebook. The social media had user behavior data, where they learn when you are opening the application, device model, carrier, and more. Zoom removed the function later on, but they were a bit late because New York’s attorney general filed a lawsuit.

Overall, I do suggest the professionals move on because they are delivering a false impression of “Security & Privacy.”

Bottom Line

Houseparty owned by Epic Games & I have faith (they addressed the situation) in them because they have been serving the community for a very long time. However, I wouldn’t say the same for Zoom because they didn’t respond to the claims made by media publications and security researchers. I would love to know your opinion in the comment section below.

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