How to stop Otter and Fireflies joining your calls.
To stop an Otter or Fireflies notetaker bot joining your meetings, switch off auto-join in that tool if the bot is yours. If a guest brought it, remove it from the participant list. Then tighten your Zoom or Teams settings. No single setting blocks every bot, so the dependable fix is a mix of both.
This is for anyone who has opened a call and found an unfamiliar notetaker waiting: hosts, team leads and Zoom or Teams admins. You get a checklist for tonight, each platform’s options with the page I read, and what no setting fixes.
TL;DR
- Your own bot: set auto-join to “Meetings I manually select” (Otter) or “Only when I invite” (Fireflies), and take the notetaker off the invite. Both paths are from each vendor’s own help page.
- Someone else’s bot: remove it from the participant list, or type a command in the meeting chat: “stop otter” for Otter, “/ff leave” for Fireflies. Then use Zoom sign-in, waiting room and domain settings, or the Teams admin bot policy.
- No setting stops every bot. Zoom has no switch for “notetakers”, and Teams’ bot-detection option holds detected bots in the lobby; its other option detects nothing.
- What I checked: vendor pages, read on 12 November 2026; the Otter and Fireflies pages read again on 15 November. I hand-tested none of the removals.
What do I do tonight?
Work down this list in order; the figure shows the same decision as a tree.
- Find out whose bot it is. Check the participant list and ask the room.
- Turn off your own auto-join. In Fireflies, choose “Only when I invite”. In Otter, choose “Meetings I manually select”.
- Check your calendar. Events you set by hand keep their old setting, and a Fireflies Recording Rule can override auto-join.
- Remove a bot that is already in. Use the participant list, or the chat command:
stop otterfor Otter,/ff leavefor Fireflies. See the live-removal section. - Raise the door. In Zoom, require sign-in and use the waiting room for guests. In Teams, check the external bots policy.
- Say what you can’t block. A guest can record from a desktop app with no bot at all, so ask people to disclose.
How do I stop my own Otter or Fireflies bot joining?
Change the default from “join everything” to “only when I choose”, then check your calendar.
- Fireflies: Dashboard or Settings, “Auto-record meetings or Auto-join calendar meetings”, choose “Only when I invite”. Recording Rules (by keyword, email or domain) override auto-join, and if it still joined, check that fred@fireflies.ai isn’t on the invite.
- Otter: Integrations, Meetings tab, Default auto-join settings, choose “Meetings I manually select”. The same choice is on the homepage: Meetings tab, AI Notetaker settings. Events you switched on or off by hand keep their setting, so look over your calendar afterwards.
Sources: Fireflies’ guide to removing it from a meeting (read 15 Nov 2026; it said “last updated 5 days ago”, with no absolute date) and Otter’s “Stop Otter Notetaker from automatically joining your meetings” (Otter’s help centre shows it updated 13 Nov 2026; read 15 Nov 2026).
How do I remove a bot that is already in the meeting?
Remove it like any participant, or type its chat command. Neither needs an account with the tool.
- Fireflies, Zoom: participant list, More next to Fireflies Notetaker, Remove.
- Fireflies, Google Meet: participant list, the three-dot menu, “Remove from the call”.
- Fireflies, Teams: participant list, the three-dot menu, “Remove from meeting”.
- Fireflies, any platform: type
/ff leavein the meeting chat. Fireflies says that if it is removed before 3 minutes, no transcript or notes are created. - Otter, Zoom, Google Meet or Teams: type “stop otter” in the meeting chat. Otter says any participant can do this, including people without an Otter account, and that it removes every Otter Notetaker in the meeting at once.
- Otter, one notetaker at a time: open the Otter conversation from the Notetaker link in the chat and click Stop Notetaker, then “Yes, turn it off”. Otter says participants can open it from the chat link; the owner’s chat setting decides whether they see the notes.
Sources: the Fireflies guide above and Otter’s “Remove Otter Notetaker from your meeting (Zoom, Google Meet, or Microsoft Teams)” (Otter’s help centre shows it updated 9 Nov 2026; read 15 Nov 2026).
How do I block notetaker bots in Zoom?
Zoom has no single “block AI notetakers” switch. You combine settings that make it harder for an unknown guest to get in, and none is a guarantee.
| Zoom setting | What it does | Limit |
|---|---|---|
| Require sign-in to join | Keeps anonymous guests, including bots, out. | Also keeps out real guests who are not signed in. |
| Waiting room for guest users | Holds anyone not signed in until the host admits them. | You have to read the list and say no to “Fireflies Notetaker”. |
| Block users in specific domains | Settings, Meeting tab, Security: enter the domains to block (separate several with commas). | Zoom says the list works with authentication profiles; without sign-in it cannot verify a domain. A host can still let a blocked person in as an authentication exception. If the toggle is grey, an admin locked it. |
| Meeting SDK block list | Lets you choose which published Meeting SDK apps can join your meetings. | Zoom’s page covers published apps only. |
Sources, all opened 12 Nov 2026 (none shows a date): Zoom: blocking bots from joining meetings and webinars, Zoom: blocking users in specific domains and Zoom: authentication profiles.
The domain list is the setting forum answers reach for first, and the least certain, because of that sign-in requirement. I did not test whether a given bot is stopped by it.
How does a Teams admin block notetaker bots?
In the Teams admin center, open the meeting policy and find “Manage external bots and their access to meetings”, in the Meeting Join and Lobby section. The policy page I read lists two options, and neither is an outright block.
- When detected, require approval before joining (default; PowerShell
RequireApprovalWhenDetected): detected bots wait in the lobby, whatever the lobby setting, until an organizer admits them. - Do not detect bots (
AllowBots): bots look like any other external participant.
The setting is the ExternalBotAccessMode attribute of the meeting policy, and Microsoft’s page says it works for
users or groups, or tenant-wide on the global policy. Its listed limits: some bots won’t be detected, and a person can be
mistaken for a bot, which an organizer fixes with “This is not a bot”. Microsoft advises letting only organizers and co-organizers admit people from the lobby.
Source: Microsoft Learn, Manage external bots and their access to meetings, opened 12 Nov 2026; page metadata shows it dated 22 May 2026 and updated 20 Jul 2026.
Where top results differ. The Microsoft page I opened lists no “block detected bots” value. Its examples name Set-CsTeamsEventsPolicy while its text says Set-CsTeamsMeetingPolicy, likely a typo; I ran neither. If you need a hard block, run
Get-Help Set-CsTeamsMeetingPolicy -Parameter ExternalBotAccessMode on your own tenant and read which values it
accepts before you promise anyone one. For the older levers, blocking anonymous join and deciding who waits in the lobby, see Microsoft’s Teams security guide (dated 28 Aug 2026; opened 12 Nov 2026).
What we have and have not tested
Dated 12 November 2026; Otter and Fireflies steps read again on 15 November 2026.
- Read, not run: every Otter, Fireflies, Zoom and Teams step above comes from the vendor’s or a university IT page. We did not remove a bot, change a Zoom setting or run a Teams command ourselves.
- Tested by hand: Noted taking notes of a call with no bot in the meeting, by our founder on Mac and Windows, November 2026.
- Read in Noted’s code: on Mac the app records call audio through a Core Audio tap that needs the “System Audio Recording Only” permission; on Windows it records the output device through loopback. The call detector looks at which apps are using the microphone, every 5 seconds. In those files the audio source is the computer’s own output, and we did not look for meeting-join code anywhere else.
- Not run: a live call with a bot present next to Noted, so we have no result for how the two behave together.
Our point of view
We think the person running the meeting should decide who records it, and that “no bot” must never mean “nobody told”. That is why Noted takes notes from your computer’s audio and no bot joins, as the Noted Notetaker page says. It is also why the app has a ready-made line you can paste into a call, “Heads up: I’m taking notes of this call with Noted.”, and why the page says to let people know. A bot is at least visible in the participant list; a bot-free recorder is not, so the disclosure has to come from the person using it. Fireflies’ own guide tells its bot-free users to disclose too.
We also think blocking is the wrong goal for most teams. The useful rule is a habit: say when you record, ask before you join. Our consent post covers what to say.
Where Noted is better: nothing joins the call, so there is no bot for anyone to remove or block, and the free plan includes meeting notes. Your notes stay on your computer, with no cloud copy unless you share a note by link.
Limitations, honestly
- Noted does not stop anyone’s bot. It is a way to take your own notes with nothing in the participant list. For keeping other people’s bots out, Zoom’s and Teams’ own controls are the better tool.
- Otter and Fireflies are better at their own defaults. Fireflies’ Recording Rules skip meetings by keyword, email or domain, and Otter’s auto-join default can be set at the source. If the bot is your team’s, those settings fix it there, while Zoom and Teams settings only filter at the door.
- A bot joins from the vendor’s side. Noted needs the app running on your computer during the call.
- Bot-free recorders exist on both sides. Fireflies’ guide describes a Desktop App “Take Notes” mode that captures system audio with no notetaker in the meeting, and Otter’s desktop app announcement (7 Oct 2025, opened 12 Nov 2026) says the same. A guest can capture your meeting without any bot to block.
- Noted’s platforms: Mac and Windows, per the Notetaker page (checked 12 Nov 2026). How it works is in AI meeting notes without a bot, and recording both sides of a call on a Mac shows the setup.
FAQ
Can I stop someone else’s Otter or Fireflies joining my Zoom meeting?
Not completely. You can require sign-in, use the waiting room, block domains and remove the bot when it appears. Zoom’s own page lists those controls; none is a full block.
Does Teams have a setting that blocks bots outright?
The Microsoft page I read on 12 Nov 2026 lists detection with lobby approval (the default) or no detection. Check your tenant for anything newer.
How do I remove Otter in the middle of a meeting?
Type “stop otter” in the Zoom, Google Meet or Teams chat. Otter’s help page says any participant can, with or without an Otter account, and that it removes all Otter Notetakers in the call. If you have permission to remove participants, you can also remove it from the participant list.
How do I remove Fireflies in the middle of a meeting?
Remove it from the participant list, click Stop in the Live meeting banner on your Fireflies dashboard, or type /ff leave
in the chat.
Why did Fireflies join when I turned auto-join off?
Fireflies’ guide points to three causes: your auto-record preference, a Recording Rule, or fred@fireflies.ai being invited by hand.
Can a guest record my meeting without a bot?
Yes. Both Otter and Fireflies have desktop modes that record without a bot, and any app that listens to computer audio does the same. Ask people to say so.
Is this affiliated with Otter, Fireflies, Zoom or Microsoft?
No. Noted isn’t affiliated with any of them. Names and settings belong to their owners, and menus change.
Prefer nothing joining at all? See Noted Notetaker, free for meeting transcripts on Mac and Windows, and how Noted compares with Otter.