Zoom's AI assistant uses ChatGPT to summarize missed meetings
Zoom has launched an "AI Companion," integrating artificial intelligence from ChatGPT's maker OpenAI as well as Meta. The new tool is designed to help users catch up on missed meetings and respond quickly to chat messages. Per the official blog post, AI Companion "empowers individuals by helping them be more productive, connect and collaborate with teammates, and improve their skills." The tool will also be able to suggest action points and highlight discussion topics after meetings.
The company plans to make further enhancements to the tool
AI Companion is currently available to premium Zoom users at no added cost. The company plans to bring additional features in the coming weeks. Those include assistance with writing emails and summarizing chat messages. After further enhancements, which will be made in the future, the tool will be able to help users find documents, file support tickets, and prepare for upcoming meetings based on live or past calls.
The new tool sparks privacy concerns
Zoom's latest AI Companion, however, raises privacy concerns among users. The company has faced criticism in the past for misleading end-to-end encryption claims and emotion-monitoring technology. Now that the company has introduced a generative AI tool into the platform, it could exacerbate these concerns.
Zoom claims it won't user communication data for AI training
Zoom said that its AI Companion will respect user privacy and clarified that it doesn't use communications data to train its AI. Zoom won't use "audio, video, chat, screen sharing, attachments, or other communications...to train Zoom's or third-party artificial intelligence models," per the official blog. However, the app can still collect "service-generated data," such as user telemetry and product usage data. In August 2023, Zoom was called out because the app's terms allowed harvesting user data for AI training.
