 Tom here for more systems we're gonna talk about privacy problems of zoom and what can be done about it and why open source It's just a better way to go If you want to learn more about me or my company head over to launch systems comm if you'd like to hire short project There's a hires button up at the top if you want to support the channel in other ways There's some affiliate links down below to get you deals and discounts on products and services that we talk about on This channel and zoom I've used him quit a few times I have been at the mercy many times of the tools that are available That work really well and had to use it because I was invited on a podcast or a YouTube channel And this is what they were using. I've used it myself for a while. It works really well But when you can't figure out a business model or even when there is payment going in frequently selling your data is a way They monetize all the things of the internet that you get for free or even pay What seems like a really reasonable price for zoom is no exception to that. They've had a lot of problems They've really I was happy and I didn't report that they stepped up their game and are offering a lot of free services during the pandemic here But that comes with the challenges of what are they doing in the background? It's all closer, so you can't see it and they say research groups say they're using shady techniques News likes to grab on to things that can you know are very headline grabbing zoom being in the headlines Well, it's very headline grabbing and that's all I can really say about they're not really offering a solution to the problem And I will point out the EFF has some good information on zoom now first thing is zoom is not as end-to-end encrypted as people Think it is and this is the first challenge the privacy implications There's an assumption of privacy that your conversations private well technically zoom has access to it So if I start a video conference with you zoom also becomes that third party So is it an end not in a traditional sense of a very strong and an encrypted product where only me and the person I'm talking to are involved zoom actually has the connection as well zoom has not been forthcoming about what they do with the data This is where some of the problems come in But their popularity simply because it works so well. I will go a step further and say You know I think zoom is probably still one of the good ones out there in terms of ease of use ease of setup easy for people to present And get data around but never you should assume that you should share very personal information now this gets even more convoluted because they relax some of the HIPAA requirements for telemedicine and Zoom is on the authorized list, but technically you are not just sharing it with you and the medical professional It may be conferencing with you if zoom depending on what they do with their privacy Well, they can have someone watching it there. That's definitely an issue that is not really easy to address So I still think zoom is a pretty good product, but I will admit is there something better Yes, there is and it's been a while since I really dove into Jitsie I remember when it was a small project and it's become quite the big project and quite reliable and we're gonna start with Is Jitsie free? Yes, but Tom doesn't have just mean they're selling my data again and no So I want to start there before we dive into what Jitsie is here So Jitsie is a set of open source projects that allow you to easily build deploy secure video conferencing solutions We are best known for our Jitsie meet video conferencing platform meet dot Jitsie Where most a where you can host a Jitsie meet instance for the community and the user can totally have free video conferencing with the Jitsie video bridge it provides multi-party video compatibilities is Jitsie free Yes, it is Jitsie is a hundred percent open source freely available and develop We also run Jitsie dot means a free service and of course this means how does they get paid? You can't just run things for free if you know how the internet works servers cost money Especially things like this here. So how to what funds all this and I'll highlight this right here We are fortunate that our friends at 8 by 8 8 by it is another phone company uses Jitsie technology for products like their virtual office So they actually bundle this into a commercial product over at 8 by 8 by doing so This is the free version that you can use on their website So you can go here start a video conference and you're gonna notice There's not even a sign-in option at the top So actually there's a little bit of confusion some people have about Jitsie of well How does it work if I don't sign in that they're not stealing my privacy? And we're gonna show you exactly how to start a Jitsie call. So we're gonna go here to start a call I know really challenging here, and we'll call it It comes up with a stupid name for your meeting or you can come up with a stupid name here for your Meeting and go now. That's an email meeting a stupid name here for your meeting. All right. I did it You please note They don't have any information on me You can actually see behind the scenes in the studio what it looks like behind me too. So that's kind of cool That quickly I can start it I have I can add a password because if I don't add a password by the way Anyone who has this link up at the top here is going to be able to go meet that Jitsie a stupid name for your meeting And they can join but if I put a password on it not everyone can join so Jitsie works perfectly fine for this It's probably weird seeing a delay for how that works, but let's talk about feature-wise view full screen start a live stream They support live streaming via YouTube you can tie your YouTube account to this Please note. I've tied nothing to this so it's just gonna ask me. Hey, would you like to do this once again? No privacy problems. What about screen sharing? Well, let's do that So go over here and we can go to share your screen. We'll choose an application window and Let's see We'll just choose what we can that would be weird. Let's see happens. We share this Now that's fun So yes, you can and I can move the mouse and make it have fun. Yes, you can share your screen I just had too many other things open so I can do this without having to load any plugins Please note. I loaded no software. I shared no information with Jitsie I didn't do anything but turn it on create a stupid meeting name and join then you can share it out to other people So there's a lot more features that maybe I'll do a more in-depth video on Jitsie But it's pretty easy to get started pretty easy to start with the features The fact is you don't have to load anything the only thing that you didn't see me do because I've used it before Was it asked to allow to use my webcam and microphone which I said yes to get this meeting started So it's a free product, but it's funded therefore is not built on selling your data It is also open source and one of the things you see has is the ability to build your own Jitsie server If you're familiar with how to set up Server images they have a lot of instructions how to do this and you can build this within your own company within your own Hosting platforms and host it online and say you know what I don't trust Jitsie even though they're open source But the source code is available. I don't trust them to host it. I wanted to host it all myself. Well They give you that ability now you've eliminated I think more corporate companies should probably look into things like that if they always have questions about these third parties And maybe what they're doing with it and they want to host it themselves because they have infrastructure They you know have the ability to spin up a cloud server on this is something even when we've thought about doing is having our own Jitsie because then I can set up a Jitsie instance just for my company and I know it's well trusted easy to do requires No plugins and easy to Get people started and I'm without those weird privacy concerns and sign-ins and everything else So I'm gonna say Jitsie is probably one of my favorite alternatives to zoom It still doesn't have as many features as zoom I you know that's a little bit of a challenge one of them that I really like is the way zoom splits out and manages all The audio but Jitsie does have the ability to record they just happen to save it to Dropbox But if you host your own instance more options can become available So it does require some Dropbox I believe is the only way you can save the meeting directly versus zoom natively will save it to your computer So there's always privacy concerns with any of these places I always just keep an open mind on them and very much read all the details I know no one really wants to read those terms and conditions But no one should really be surprised at a private company that gives away a product for very low prices or even free in Many platforms has a bunch of privacy implications where they sell your data because monetizing the fact that you exist And what you do with your existence is pretty much a common business model with the internet right now So always keep an open mind about that, but go ahead and check out Jitsie. I'll leave a link to it It's a great product and you know if you're just too concerned about zoom do it also when you're transporting things on the internet And you're not as clear on the encryption Just use caution when you're doing it if you're if you're really unclear I just bring it up a lot because people think hey look it says it's encrypted I see the padlock I see the lock on there always double-check think about the platforms you're using It's more about awareness than anything else be careful what you share only if you really really trust the platform and the encryption methods on there All right, thanks, and thank you for making it to the end of the video If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up if you'd like to see more content from the channel Hit the subscribe button and hit the bell icon if you like YouTube to notify you when new videos come out If you'd like to hire us head over to laurancesystems.com fill out our contact page And let us know what we can help you with and what projects you'd like us to work together on If you want to carry on the discussion head over to forums.laurancesystems.com Or we can carry on the discussion about this video other videos or other tech topics in general even suggestions for new videos They're accepted right there on our forums, which are free Also, if you like to help the channel in other ways head over to our affiliate page We have a lot of great tech offers for you and once again, thanks for watching and see you next time