Guidelines for Using Zoom’s AI Companion Tools
Healthcare and education customers have unique industry-specific data security and privacy concerns.
Be sure to follow the guidelines in the Responsible Use section below. This page will be updated as new features become available.
Responsible Use of AI Companions
Hosts of Zoom meetings should always caution meeting attendees not to discuss or reveal personally identifiable information about themselves or others during the meeting through a Zoom chat or otherwise. Inadvertently disclosing personally identifiable information can put the University in jeopardy of violating various privacy and security laws, especially if the meetings are recorded or an AI companion is used to summarize the meeting.
If a Zoom host uses an AI companion to summarize the meeting, before sharing a summary Zoom hosts must also:
- Verify the accuracy of the summary and edit it to correct any inaccuracies.
- Delete any personally identifiable information that may have been captured in the summary. This includes a person’s full name or other information that alone would allow someone in the community to identify the person.
For security reasons, summaries will be deleted from the Zoom server after 60 days.
Features Enabled
Zoom does not use any customer audio, video, chat, screen sharing, attachments or other communications-like content (such as poll results, whiteboard, and reactions) to train Zoom’s or third-party AI models. At the University of Delaware, we reviewed the necessary FERPA and HIPAA compliance requirements and, after careful deliberation, have enabled the following AI Companion features:
AI Companion for Individual Accounts
Zoom’s AI Companion is a personal assistant that provides real-time answers during meetings and across the Zoom Workplace, allowing users to access information, ask questions, generate summaries, and take actions directly within the platform through a dedicated side panel, essentially acting as a virtual co-pilot to help users stay focused and productive throughout their workday; it can provide insights like key discussion points, action items, and even clarify details about attendees, all based on the context of the conversation and meeting content.
This feature is available to all UD Zoom account holders, but is turned off by default. Turning on this feature will add the question panel to the software app window and open AI features to all other Zoom functions. It will also add the question panel to all live meetings for the individual.
Important: The Meeting Questions Panel, which allows participants to ask questions directly related to a live meeting discussion cannot be initiated through the Personal AI Companion. Only the host of a meeting can turn on this function.
How to turn on the Personal AI Companion and Meeting Questions Panel:
- Sign in to the Zoom Host account at udel.edu/zoom.
- In the navigation menu, click Settings.
- Choose the AI Companion tab at the top of the window.
- Under the General settings, click the toggle to enable “AI Companion panel in Zoom Workplace.”
- Under the Meeting settings, click the toggle to “Allow users to ask AI Companion questions about the meeting.”
- Scroll down to see settings for individual AI features that can be changed as needed.
Meeting Questions Panel
The AI Companion feature uses AI technology to allow meeting participants to ask questions about the content of the meeting. Preset questions are provided, such as “Catch me up”, “Was my name mentioned?”, and “What are the action items?”, which can be useful for catching up when you join late or return after stepping away from the meeting. More specific custom questions are also possible, like “Was a date agreed on?” and “Was there a decision on the name?”.
Presetting AI Companion Questions Panel in a scheduled meeting:
- When scheduling a meeting, check the box to automatically start meeting questions.
- Participants can click the Sparkle Icon
on the in-meeting controls to start the questions panel. - To stop the panel, the host clicks the Sparkle Icon and the blue toggle button.
Remember: Presetting the meeting questions panel starts this function when the meeting begins. This will include any personal discussions (vacation plans, dog photos, etc.) that may occur at the beginning or end of a meeting. If you don’t want that material included, enable the panel when the important discussion starts and stop the panel when the discussion ends.
Starting AI Companion Questions Panel in a live meeting:
- On the in-meeting controls, the host clicks the Sparkle Icon .
- Participants can click the Sparkle Icon on the in-meeting controls to start the questions panel.
- To stop the panel, the host clicks the Sparkle Icon and the blue toggle button.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who can start a meeting question panel?
Only hosts start a meeting question panel.
Who sees the questions asked?
Only the person asking the questions can see the answers.
Are questions saved?
No, questions are not saved.
Why is a questions panel opening for my participants even though I have the setting turned off?
There are two types of question panels. All UD Zoom account owners are able to turn on a personal AI Questions Panel, but it does not connect to a live meeting unless the host turns on that setting.
Meeting Summary
Zoom Meeting hosts can now create a summary of the meeting transcript and share it with others. Summaries are saved to the host’s secure Zoom repository and can be shared with meeting participants and those who didn’t attend live to improve team collaboration and speed up productivity. The summary will include a short overview, next steps, and full recap of the meeting.
Presetting Meeting Summary in a scheduled meeting:
- When scheduling a meeting, check the box to automatically start a meeting summary.
- The meeting summary will begin to be generated as soon as the first person joins the meeting.
- As participants join, they will see a notification informing them that the Meeting Transcript Summary is active. They may choose to exit the meeting if they do not wish to participate.
- The host and all participants will see a blinking sparkle icon at the top of the meeting window.
- To stop the summary, the host clicks the Sparkle Icon and the blue toggle button.
Remember: Presetting the meeting questions panel starts this function when the meeting begins. This will include any personal discussions (vacation plans, dog photos, etc.) that may occur at the beginning or end of a meeting. If you don’t want that material included, start the panel when the important discussion commences and stop the panel when the discussion ends.
Starting Meeting Summary in a live meeting:
- On the in-meeting controls, the host clicks the Sparkle Icon .
- The meeting summary will begin to be generated, and participants will see a notification informing them that the Meeting Transcript Summary is active. They may choose to exit the meeting if they do not wish to participate.
- The host and all participants will see a blinking sparkle icon at the top of the meeting window.
- To stop the summary, click the Sparkle Icon and click the blue toggle button.
Managing Meeting Summary:
- Sign in to the Zoom Host account at www.udel.edu/zoom.
- In the navigation menu, click Meeting Summary with AI Companion.
- In the My Summaries tab, select from the list to access the meeting summary, enter a meeting topic or meeting ID, or select a date range to search for a specific meeting summary.
- Choose from the following options:
- Share: Send the summary through email. You will be prompted to enter one or more email addresses or contact names, then click Share.
- Edit: Modify the summary and then click Save.
- Delete: Permanently delete the summary.
Note: This action cannot be undone and the deleted summary cannot be restored.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who can start a meeting summary?
Only hosts start a meeting summary.
Where can you locate a saved summary?
Summaries are saved to the original account that scheduled the meeting.
How long are summaries saved?
Summaries are saved on the host account for 60 days.
Why isn’t my meeting summary immediately available?
Summaries will take a few minutes to render. The host will receive an email message when the summary is ready for viewing.
Do I need to record my meeting?
Meetings do not need to be recorded to use the meeting summary feature.
What happens if my participants ask to start a summary?
Participants can click on the Sparkle icon to request a meeting summary. The host will see a pop-up message and can deny the invitation or start the AI Companion feature.
Additional AI Features
Whiteboards
https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/article?id=zm_kb&sysparm_article=KB0057610
Smart Recording
https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/article?id=zm_kb&sysparm_article=KB0061101
Out-of-Meeting and Team Chat
https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/category?id=kb_category&kb_category=102cd079c3bdf1104b490e8dc0013105