Federal prosecutors in the United States accuse Xinjiang Jin, chief executive of Zoom, who is tasked with "technical security", of working with the Chinese government to monitor users and suppress video calls, according to a Washington Post report.
Justice Ministry prosecutors said on Friday that a security executive at the video technology giant Zoom had worked with the Chinese government to terminate Americans' accounts and disrupt video calls about the 1989 massacre of pro-democracy activists in Tiananmen Square.
The issue is a big blow to Zom, one of the most famous new American tech giants, who during the pandemic has become one of the main ways in which people work, communicate with others and exchange ideas around the world.
The California-based company is now worth more than $ 100 billion.
But the CEO's work with the Chinese government - as FBI agents alleged in a criminal complaint unveiled Friday in federal court in Brooklyn - shines a spotlight on hidden threats to censorship on a forum promoted as a platform for free speech.
It also raises questions about how Zoom protects user data from governments that seek to monitor and suppress people within and outside their borders.
Prosecutors said the China-based Xinjiang CEO Jin served as Zoom's main liaison with Chinese law enforcement and intelligence agencies, sharing user information and ending video calls at the request of the Chinese government.
Jin monitored Zoom's video system for discussions on political and religious topics that the ruling Communist Party in China deemed unacceptable, as stated in the complaint, and gave government officials names, email addresses and other sensitive information to users, even those outside of China.
Jane also worked to finish at least 4 video conferences in May and June, including commemorative video calls with US-based dissidents.
A Zoom spokesman said in a statement on Friday that the company had cooperated with the case and had launched its own internal investigation.
The company said it shares “a limited amount of individual user data with the Chinese authorities,” in addition to data of no more than 10 users outside of China.
The statement said Jin was fired for violating company policies, and other employees were placed on administrative leave until the investigation was completed.
The company's CEO, Eric Yuan, was born in China, but moved to Silicon Valley in the late 1990s, where he worked for WebX before founding Zoom in 2011 (Reuters)
In an updated statement on the Zoom website, the company acknowledged its "default" by adhering to Chinese law and ending the meetings rather than only denying access to participants in China.
The company said it had restored victims' accounts and would no longer allow Chinese government requests to affect users outside of China.
"As the Department of Justice explains, every American company, including Zoom and its industry peers, faces challenges when doing business in China," the company said in its statement.
"We will continue to work aggressively to anticipate and combat the ever-evolving data security challenges," she added.
Although Jin lives in China and not the United States, officials said he could be transferred to the United States to face trial if he travels to a country that has an extradition treaty with the United States.
Who is benefiting?
Human rights activists said this summer that their Zoom accounts had been abruptly terminated before or shortly after they hosted video calls to mark the 31st anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests.
In a statement afterward, Zoom said that the company "must comply with the laws in the countries in which we operate".
She added that she regrets "that some recent meetings with participants inside and outside China have been negatively affected," and the statement stated that it is not within the company's authority "to change the laws of governments that oppose freedom of expression."
Zhou Fengsu, a student leader during the Tiananmen Square protests, whose Zoom account was terminated this summer, told The Washington Post Friday that he had worked with the FBI on the case and considered the accusations as "tremendous news."
"It is amazing to me how this American company, which has this connection, will report directly" to the Chinese Communist Party and "regularly disrupt our meetings on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party," he added.
"This executive was working for the government and the police as an aid to the persecution, and Zom was paying this man in exchange for doing this work," he added.
Prosecutors charged Jane, also known as Julian Jane, with conspiracy to commit harassment between states and pass on a method of identification.
The complaint said Jin, 39, had been with the company since 2016, and his last role at the company was "security technical leader."
Citing e-mails between Jin and other Zoom employees, FBI agents identified a months-long campaign of intense pressure by China's "Internet Police" to render users video calls and quell unwanted speech.
In a letter last April, Jin said he had been summoned to a meeting with Chinese government officials who demanded Zoom to develop the ability to end any "illegal meeting" within one minute.
In other cases, Jin sent meeting passwords and other sensitive internal data directly to Chinese law enforcement authorities.
Human rights activists said this summer that their Zoom accounts had been abruptly terminated before or shortly after they hosted video calls to mark the 31st anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests (Reuters)
The problems of companies operating in China
John Demers, assistant attorney general for national security, said that the company - like many others operating in China - has put itself in a difficult position by operating a zoom in an authoritarian country whose laws and practices often conflict with our values, as he put it.
"The company focused on complying with Chinese law and the expectations of Chinese law enforcement authorities," Demers added, but what has happened over time is that these expectations have increased.
So it goes from "Okay, respond to our legal requests", to "You must take action within a minute to close any action on your platform" - not only in China, but abroad - when it comes to topics sensitive to the Chinese government. "
"This case is an illustration of the options companies have to make when they do business in China ... and how the Chinese government will use the influence it has over you to advance its agenda," he said.
"You have a consistent pattern of the Chinese government using economic leverage - access to markets and foreign investment - to achieve more political goals," he said.
John Scott Railton, a researcher at the Citizen Lab in Toronto, said the recording showed how increasingly authoritarian governments viewed major tech companies as high-priority intelligence targets ready for infiltration and recruitment.
The charges were announced the same day the Trump administration added 4 Chinese companies to its list of Commerce Department entities to enable human rights violations within China by providing DNA testing materials or high-tech surveillance equipment to the Chinese government.
Zoom has faced questions before about how to protect it from the potential misuse of video data by the Chinese government, which monitors major news and social media sites under what is known as the "Great Firewall."
Scott Railton and another researcher discovered this spring that the company had routed US user data through Chinese servers, which could open it to Chinese government data requests.
The company later said it had "accidentally" sent US video calls to Chinese data centers amid a torrent of calls.
Zoom employs more than 2,500 people worldwide, including - as of last year - more than 500 in China who develop software installed in computers around the world.
Wang Dan, a Chinese dissident whose call on Zoom was disrupted in Tiananmen Square this spring, said the case showed how China could threaten the freedom of expression of people in the West.
"Interfering with the freedom of expression of those who settled and lived in the United States in exile is ... a dangerous attack on American sovereignty," he told the Washington Post on Friday.
"The American people should also pay more attention to the Chinese Communist Party's threat to American democracy," he added.
The billionaire founder and CEO of the company, Eric Yuan, was born in China but moved to Silicon Valley in the late 1990s, where he worked for the video startup WebEx before founding Zoom in 2011.