[ad_1]
While the Clubhouse social audio platform has seen a significant increase in recent times, such as with the sudden rise of the group video streaming app Zoom last year, this rapid acceleration in exposure has led to a closer examination of its processes and discovered several major flaws that will need to be quickly addressed in order to reassure users and avoid further complications.
The latest is that hackers gain access to Clubhouse audio and re-record that data in third-party streams.
As explained by Bloomberg:
An unidentified user was able to stream Clubhouse audio streams from ‘multiple rooms’ to their own third-party website this weekend, said Reema Bahnasy, a spokesperson for Clubhouse. As the company claims it is “permanently banned” from this user and installed “Guardrails” to avoid repetition, researchers say the platform may not be able to make such promises. “
Clubhouse audio was previously available through GitHub using a similar process:
Indeed, various application researchers and web security experts have already sounded the alarm about the Clubhouse and the safety and potential exposure of its systems. Some have also noted the app’s connection to China, similar to TikTok, with Clubhouse routing much of its back-end operations through systems based in China. This could leave the Clubhouse data exposed to the CCP, if the Chinese government is interested. There is no evidence that this has happened, or ever will be, but it is another potential concern, which, like TikTok, could potentially prompt the U.S. government to look into it.
Clubhouse has also faced various challenges when it comes to content moderation and behavior management within the app. These challenges are exacerbated by the app’s live engagement, making it more difficult to censor and limit discussions that could deepen territory of concern.
As Vice noted:
“UThe Sers warn that extravagant coronavirus conspiracy theories – ranging from false rumors that the vaccine is made from fetal cells to 5G satellites controlling people through social distancing – are quickly spreading across the app. Those who speak out against these false allegations may even face harassment and abuse. “
Indeed, various users have raised concerns about these and other forms of harassment and abuse, both within and from Clubhouse chats. This puts increased pressure on the app to implement more protective measures before wider public release.
For its part, Clubhouse acknowledged that it had work to do in this regard. In October last year, the app released an update of its work to address various moderation concerns, while last month it outlined its main areas of focus going forward, in particular moderation and improvement of user safety.
“User safety has always been a top priority for us, and as we welcome more people, it will remain so. This means strengthening our trust and security and support teams as we grow, continuing to invest in advanced tools to detect and prevent abuse. , and increasing the functionality and training resources available to moderators. We will also be actively developing our support team so that everyone’s clubs can get same-day approval. “
It must be recognized, of course, that Clubhouse is still very young, and it is unrealistic to expect all the bases to be covered so early in its process.
But then again, it has several past examples of similar issues and social apps to continue – given the high-level challenges that all other major social apps face, Clubhouse should have a better plan in place to prepare for any. such concerns ahead of time, which does not appear to be the case.
And that, again, is aside from security concerns and the connection to support systems based in China. Right now, Clubhouse is still in invite-only mode, which, at least in part, is designed to give the platform more leeway to address these issues before launching out to everyone else, and making those issues worse. concerns. But there are significant issues here – and if Clubhouse can’t scale quickly, high-profile users will quickly turn to alternative tools, like Twitter spaces, where they can use their already established social graph to reach more people. with their audio chats, without the same problems.
This is the biggest challenge Clubhouse faces now as it looks to the next step. In that sense, its invitation-only approach is a wiser way to go – but can it resolve all of these concerns in time to maximize its growth momentum?
Some key things to watch out for in the continued development of the app.
[ad_2]
Source link
