Zoom says it doesn't steal customer content to train AI models

A recent change to Zoom's terms of service regarding AI has set off alarm bells in Hollywood and across the tech world — some interpreting the video conferencing provider's update as granting the company royalty-free rights in perpetuity to video calls and client presentations for model training purposes. 'IA.

In response, Zoom said it does not use any audio, video, or client chat content for AI training without consent. Additionally, according to the company, the "service-generated data" it collects is intended to "ensure that we are not unwittingly used to spam or defraud participants" using its AI-powered features. /p>

A post on the StackDiary blog on Sunday said Zoom's new terms of service appear to give the impression that the company was "willing to go to any lengths to reuse other people's content for AI training."

The message quoted Section 10.4 of the Zoom Terms of Service, which reads: "You agree to 'grant and hereby grant to Zoom a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicensable, transferable license and all other rights required or necessary to redistribute, publish, import, access, use, store, transmit, review, disclose, preserve, retrieve, modify, reproduce, share, use, display, copy, distribute, translate, transcribe, create derivative works of, and process Customer Content and perform all acts relating to the Customer Content,” including for “machine learning” and “artificial intelligence” purposes.” for “improving Zoom’s services, software, or other products, services and software.”

"This effectively allows Zoom to train its AI on client content without providing an opt-out option , a decision likely to spark a significant debate about user privacy and consent,” wrote StackDiary’s Alex Ivanovs.

"Never use @Zoom again", Justine Bateman, the filmmaker who is an AI advisor for SAG - AFTRA, posted on X (Twitter) Sunday, quoting StackDiary post.

In a blog post Monday, Zoom chief product officer Smita Hashim said that the company had updated the terms of service in March 2023 to "be more transparent about how we use and who owns different forms of content on our platform". According to Zoom, "For AI, we do not use audio, video, or chat content to train our models without customer consent."

Zoom recently rolled out two generative AI features: Zoom IQ Meeting Summary and Zoom IQ Team Chat Compose , which offer automated meeting summaries and “AI-powered chat dialing,” according to Hashim. Zoom account owners and administrators control whether to enable these AI features for their accounts, she noted. If they agree to use the features, they also license Zoom for AI training.

The license language in Section 10.4 of the Zoom Terms of Service is intended to ensure "that if we provide value-additional services (such as a meeting recording), we would have the ability to do so without usage rights issues,” Hashim wrote. "The meeting recording still belongs to the customer, and we license that content in order to provide the recording service."

Confusion over AI parts of Zoom's terms of service comes as SAG-AFTRA and WGA are both activated strike as they seek a new contract with the Alliance of Film and Television Producers. When it comes to AI, the writers union wants AMPTP protections against the use of AI to generate scripts or serve as source material. SAG-AFTRA wants guarantees that performers, including background actors, will have full consent and rights of compensation on any use of a "digital replica" made by these performers.