Will Zoom listen to Mac users after the call ends?

On macOS, Zoom will continue to listen to you after the call ends. A bug that makes life difficult for application developers, it seems.

How do you know if the webcam on your smartphone or computer is listening and/or observing you after you end a call? For Apple devices, the Cupertino-based company has installed indicator lights to indicate whether a microphone and/or camera is in use. It is for this reason that some Mac users today have some concerns about the Zoom app.

On macOS, Zoom will continue to listen to you after you end the call.

Indeed, even after the end of the call, the Zoom application continues to access the computer’s microphone. Thus, it could continue to listen to the user when there would be no reason to do so anymore. The only way to stop this listening is to completely close the application.

A bug that makes life difficult for application developers.

This issue was originally reported in 2021. Zoom subsequently released an update at the end of the year to fix the issue, but users continued to report the issue. Another update was released last month. This fixed the issue for some users, but others on macOS Monterey claim it still exists, unfortunately.

It’s impossible to know at this stage if this bug is specific to macOS Monterey or if it’s present in multiple versions of macOS, but it must be admitted that it’s quite troubling. In any case, while waiting for this error to be fully fixed on all platforms, if you are still seeing the microphone or camera indicator light even after the Zoom call ends, your best bet is to close the app completely.