Google Drive will now let you spot anyone snooping around your company files

Securing your cloud storage systems is set to get a significant boost thanks to a new update from Google.

The company is updating its Google Drive platform to allow users to track external activity in their audit logs.

This should help admins spot any suspicious or unauthorized actions by external users, including attempts to copy, move or change data – keeping your important business information safe.

Google Drive audits

In a blog post announcing the news, Google noted that the change can help admins see new audit log events related to potential exfiltration that they could not see before, say for example if an external guest user makes a copy of your document in their organization.

The Google Drive audit log includes content created across a range of Google Workspace apps, including the likes of Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides, and also monitors content uploaded to Drive, such as PDFs and Microsoft Word files. 

Google says the feature will be switched on by default, and has begun rolling out to all Google Workplace customers with the Drive audit log feature now.

The news is the latest boost to Google Drive in recent weeks as the company launches a range of new tools and services.

This includes the launch of “search chips” in Drive, which lets users filter search results using various different parameters, including file type, labels and last modified date.

Google Drive will also make it possible to filter based on “To do” status, which narrows down the pool of results to include only files that have outstanding actions associated with them.

The platform will also soon begin to restrict access to files deemed to be in violation of the company’s policies. These files will be flagged to their owner and restricted automatically, which means they can no longer be shared with other people, and access will be withdrawn from everyone but the owner.

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After backlash, Zoom ditches snooping Facebook code from iOS app

Following the revelation by Motherboard on Friday (March 27) that video calling platform Zoom was sharing user information with Facebook via its iOS app, the popular video conferencing service has rolled out an update for iOS users.

Zoom has removed the data-sharing code from the app, telling Motherboard in a statement that the 'Login with Facebook' feature was implemented "in order to provide our users with another convenient way to access our platform". 

That login feature – found on several apps – is applied by using a Facebook SDK (software development kit) that connects users of the app to Facebook's Graph API (Application Programming Interface) when the app is launched. The SDK can then share information with third parties, even if a user doesn't have a social media account with Facebook.

Facebook requires app makers to share this information with users in privacy policies, however Zoom's made no explicit mention that the social media company would have access to user data if there was no linked account.

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Zoom says it was "recently made aware that the Facebook SDK was collecting unnecessary device data" and has since removed the code and an updated version of the iOS app is now available on the App Store.

According to Zoom's statement to Motherboard, the app did not share any sensitive information, like user names, emails and phone numbers, but "included data about users’ devices such as the mobile OS type and version, the device time zone, device OS, device model and carrier, screen size, processor cores, and disk space". This coincides with Motherboard's findings from last week.

Motherboard has since tried out the updated iOS app and found that Zoom has, indeed, stopped sending data to Facebook when the app is launched. 

In the 'What's New' section of the app, Zoom says that, despite the Facebook SDK being removed, users will still be able to log in with their Facebook accounts if they have one. Users have been recommended to update the app to enable the changes.

Zoom has issued an apology for the "oversight" and the company says it "takes its users’ privacy extremely seriously".

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