So far, video calls in Microsoft Teams are not end-to-end encrypted. However, this is not implemented as a standard either. Software manufacturer Microsoft plans to offer end-to-end encryption for Microsoft teams in July. This emerges from Microsoft’s updated product roadmap for the video chat application. The manufacturer presented the plans for the implementation of the encryption between participants in the video calls in March but did not provide any details on the schedule.
The plans now publicly available indicate that the technology should work across platforms. At least Microsoft names the desktop systems currently supported by Teams and the mobile clients for Android and iOS in the roadmap. Details on how the encryption works and which protocols and algorithms Microsoft intends to use are not yet known.
First, the encryption should be activated in video calls with a maximum of two endpoints. Microsoft has also already announced that group calls to which participants have to be invited manually by calendar will also be encrypted later. A schedule for this is also not yet known.
As Mspoweruser reports, the end-to-end encryption is to be introduced, but not used by default for all video calls. According to this, the responsible team admins must activate a corresponding policy, which first enables the use of end-to-end encryption. The policy can be set up for the entire company or just for individual accounts.
The competitor Zoom, which gained enormous popularity in the corona pandemic, has been experimenting with end-to-end encryption for video calls since last year. Slack has not yet been expanded in this area. Even hosted open source solutions, e.g. based on Matrix, also offer end-to-end encryption.