 I want to make a brief statement in this video because there's a piece of software I got to talk about and that is a video conferencing software that's really taken off in the past couple weeks due to this Coronavirus thing and it's called zoom. I've heard of it before But now it's all over the place because a lot of people are using zoom to talk to their friends to hang out Because you can't hang out in person Or I've even seen universities who require zoom for classes now I want to do this video and say if you have a choice in it do not use zoom There are much better alternatives that are much better for your privacy and security and all that kind of stuff zoom is not a company or It's not software you want to be relying on okay now if you want to if you want to not wait to the end of the video I will go ahead and tell you I'm gonna recommend something else. It's called talks Tox or Q talks is the name of its client. I recommend look I'll put the link to that and to other software. I might recommend that as an alternative now Let me explain why it is a better alternative than zoom, which is especially bad Okay, first off think about the history of video conferencing. Everyone hates Skype. Okay Skype is a bad piece of software It's a Microsoft piece of software Everyone knows Microsoft is just looking at all your data all the time Skype calls are never secure They go straight to Microsoft servers. They can look at them no matter what that's just how it is and Skype forces updates it does lots of terrible things out of your control and Over the past couple years people have started to leave Skype and go to other services like discord The problem with that is people have realized that discord is basically just as bad This is why people are using zoom, but I'm gonna argue that it's just it has exactly the same potentiality now Discord is just as bad. They ban people all the time. They shut down chats that they don't like They shut down groups that they don't like not groups that are even being illegal I'm just saying groups that do things that they don't like. Okay, and so now people are moving their zoom The problem is Skype and discord and zoom have the same problems two problems I'll mention. I'll boil it down to two one is the client-side application and really the whole service is Proprietary what I mean by that is it's not free and open-source software meaning when you install Skype or when you install zoom on your computer You know a computer programmer or anyone else cannot look and read the source code that is important because Skype for example Manifestly monitors your data. They look at what you're doing on your computer. What what's in your memory? What you know what programs you're running everything they can they will look at it They have the ability to and even if zoom is not doing that already because it is proprietary software They have the potentiality to do that that is something that they are able to do So even if you trust zoom right now, just say that they have the ability to do something like that same thing with discord Okay proprietary software a proprietary system the second problem is that they are not properly end-to-end encrypted They're not supposed I mean they were designed not to be end-to-end encrypted What I mean by that is in the encryption If you want to talk to someone securely you have to use end-to-end encryption It is a way of sending a message over the internet. It's set for it can it because it is encrypted It can only be read by its intended recipients. Okay now Skype is not like this what this means is or you know zoom It's the same thing zoom what they'll do is you know, let's say you're talking with your friend that video It's not going directly to your friend. It's going to a zoom server, but worse than that It is not encrypted meaning people on that server can look at it and see what's going on Same thing with discord same thing with skype all of those programs have the same issue now The the program that I recommended a second ago called talks is different and again talks is not the only one if you Don't like talks. There are many alternatives. I'll put a link to a list in the description But talks runs on windows and Mac and Linux and I think even your phone nowadays and it's Into end encrypted and it's free software. It's free software Therefore that means that it is not going to have feature features quote-unquote like it monitoring What's going on on your computer or taking your data without your permission? Because its source code is looked at by the public even if you don't know how to read source code of course But this is basic free software stuff. It is not going to have those malicious features on the client side So you don't have to worry about that that if you're using talks or another free software application Now last week I actually mentioned something called telegram which although it is not into end encrypted It's it's bet except in a special case it at least has a free software client side application When I say client side that means the thing you install on your computer So it at least is not spying on you on your computer But the problem with telegram and the problem with zoom and the problem with skype and discord and most of these features out Services out there is they're not into end encrypted meaning when whenever you send out information on telegram or zoom or skype Anyone who runs those servers can just look at the information. It is not a problem whatsoever Even if it is encrypted on the way to the servers they can still read it. It's no problem for them Okay, so that is what is different about talks talks that does not happen I think in the specific case of talks it actually doesn't even use a centralized server So it actually sends it directly to your the person the people you're talking to but aside from that Even if it did use a centralized server because it's into end encrypted You know the people on the server cannot read it. Okay, or at least, you know, if There it's in the end encrypted and they don't have the keys. That's the important thing, right? So the great thing about this why is it? Why am I this sounds like a nitpick? Whatever? What's the big deal? Well, the issue is when you're deciding what software to use And the reason I do this video now is because I don't want the whole world to get on zoom and then Two years later. We can't do anything about it when there are our alternatives that will never do you wrong They'll never give you up and the reason why talks won't give you up is because even if the people who develop talks when evil They can't do anything. They can't look at your data. They can't shut you down. They can't do anything They can't do anything malicious, you know what I mean? So that is what separates it. You don't have to trust I mean if you're if you're involved in technology You know, you don't have to if you know what you're talking about You don't want to have to trust the people who are writing your software And if you're using free software and if you're using in an encryption, you don't have to trust on them for that To always be there. It's getting a little windy. I'm gonna go inside, but I will say one example take Take Twitter. Okay. Twitter is not is social media It's different but similar and the thing with Twitter is people used to rely on Twitter five years or so ago People used to rely on Twitter because it was like a free speech bastion You could go to Twitter and you could say and do anything and it was great and Pretty much everyone was on it. Everyone was having a good time but eventually around actually probably around the 2016 election in America Twitter realized that there are people that they don't like who are using their service and Because they were a proprietary service because you know, it is and they can do whatever they want Basically, it's centralized. They can shut people down. No problem. No big deal so that's what they did now Twitter is the most stifled site on the entire internet and What why I mentioned that now it's not exactly the same when we're talking about video conferencing services But when you're looking for software to use don't use software that has the potentiality to go bad And the problem with zoom is that it has that potentiality people got sick of Skype They moved to discord people got sick of discord They went to zoom and all of them have the same problems Whereas you wouldn't have to worry about it if you just use an end-to-end encrypted free software application. Anyway, that's it So obviously I'm not telling you that you're evil or stupid for using zoom if you have to I mean if your school Mandates it. I mean, I guess you have to but that that's what I want to speak That's why I want to do this video because I don't want you to be in the situation Where everyone is just requiring the software because oh well, it's this new thing We've never heard of and we have no way of assessing if it's it could be potentially dangerous or bad or whatever Okay, anyway, that's it. I'll see you guys next time