Students still have to learn even as the schools are empty. However, administrators in New York City claim that the use of Zoom for online instruction is prohibited due to security issues with the video conferencing tool.
The city’s Department of Education is switching classrooms over to Microsoft Teams, which has the “same capabilities with appropriate security standards in place,” according to the spokeswoman.
Information on the Ban
Around 1.1 million students from more than 1,800 schools spread across the town’s five divisions will be subject to the restriction.
The decision to ban Zoom from schools was partially carried out by New York City’s Cyber Command, which was established in 2018 to assist in maintaining the safety of the city’s residents.
Zoom didn’t respond right away.
The configuration would put purportedly encrypted talks at risk of meddling by Chinese officials, analysts claimed on Friday, and Zoom’s main official expressed sorrow for “mistakenly” relaying a few calls through China.
Zoom also regrets misrepresenting its service as being end-to-end encrypted.
A flurry of “Zoombombing” complaints led Zoom to change its default settings to automatically allow passwords on video chats. These complaints involved trolls trespassing on secure calls and using them to broadcast obscene material.
Not all schools are believed to find the transition to be straightforward.
Problems Caused by the Ban
Following the conclusion of town schools on March 16, Zoom quickly sprang to fame as the go-to video calling service, as first reported by Chalkbeat.
However, a Brooklyn-based school principal pushed the magazine to stick with Zoom, citing the “clunkiness” of Microsoft’s service as a reason why it would be more difficult to remotely teach their pupils.
A representative for the city claimed that it has been teaching schools how to use Microsoft Teams for “many weeks.”
The department “remains to evaluate and monitor developments with Zoom,” according to the spokesman, and will advise schools with any changes. However, the spokesperson did not completely rule out a return to Zoom.
