Rwanda Information Society Authority (RISA) has advised against the use of ZOOM software and instructed the public institutions to stop using the video conferencing software.
According to Innocent Bagamba Muhizi, Chief Executive Officer at RISA, the platform is believed to be having security vulnerabilities.
"We stopped using it and we issued a guideline to government institutions halting its use,” Muhizi said. “It (Zoom) has security vulnerabilities and until they are fixed, we do not recommend its usage."
The vulnerabilities include routing user data through China over the past month to cope with a dramatic rise in traffic after stating that users’ meeting information would stay in the country of origin and built-in attention-tracking features to recent upticks in "Zoombombing" in which uninvited attendees break into and disrupt meetings with hate-filled or pornographic content.
Other vulnerabilities include a data-mining feature on Zoom that allowed some participants to surreptitiously have access to LinkedIn profile data about other users and call data being sent back to the company without the end-to-end encryption as promised in its marketing materials.
Video conferencing app Zoom has had a massive increase in users because of new remote work requirements due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In just a few months, its user base shot up from 10 million to 200 million people.
That spike in users also exposed a growing list of security flaws:Zoom bombing trolls have emerged, user email addresses and photos have leaked, calls aren't being end-to-end encrypted, and flaws found in the Zoom installer allow an attacker to gain root access to computers that run a malicious version of it. Even Zoom CEO Eric Yuan admitted the company moved too fast and made missteps.
These security flaws have prompted some organizations, companies, governments, government agencies, and schools to ban Zoom or restrict its use. The following list will be updated if more organizations ban or restrict the use of Zoom.
Companies that banned Zoom
- Google has banned Zoom from company-owned computers; administrators will disable it this week, and Google employees have been directed to use Duo instead.
- SpaceX has forbidden employees from using Zoom, citing security and privacy concerns.
- Smart Communications,a Philippines-based ISP, has banned Zoom for internal use.
Governments and government agencies that have banned Zoom
- Taiwan has banned Zoom for use by all government agencies.
- NASA has banned all employees from using Zoom.
- The German Foreign Ministry has restricted Zoom use to personal computers in emergency situations only.
- The United States Senate has urged its members to choose platforms other than Zoom due to security concerns, but has not issued an outright ban.
- The AustralianDefense Force
- banned its members from using Zoom after an Australian comedian Zoom bombed one of its meetings.
Educational institutions that have banned Zoom
- New York City's Department of Education has banned teachers from using Zoom and encourages them to switch to Microsoft Teams.
- Clark County Public Schools in Nevada has disabled Zoom on all school computers.
For the case of Rwanda, Muhizi said they shared alternatives such as webex (a tool that allows users to host or participate in video conferencing, online meetings, and screen sharing, with up to 1,000 participants allowed in a virtual meeting room) and Teams (collaboration platform that combines persistent workplace chat, video meetings, file storage (including collaboration on files), and application integration) in their guidelines to public institutions.
Other alternatives include signal, skype, facetime, Google hangouts renamed Google meet.
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