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Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

arstechnica.com

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Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#71

Post by freshhawk »

SpiderX wrote: post #63
freshhawk wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He phrased it like a conspiracy theorist, but it's a little naive to think that intercept capability wasn't a factor in this decision. As far as I know skype was the biggest player in communications that wasn't being completely monitored.

Skype went down for a couple days about a year or two ago, as did a few other voip services at around the same time. I suspect this is more than just a single company that is behind it, rather the US government.

Sure, it's not a secret that the NSA is the one pulling in all of the data they can get their hands on right now. And they absolutely want all skype traffic, since they already have all internet and phone traffic.

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#72

Post by grandpoobah »

CTop wrote: post #16

Just so I understand this: they're switching from direct P2P messages between users (like MSN), to routing the messages through their own data centers first (like Facebook)? So in theory this will prevent any messages ever getting lost en route to the recipient? I can't tell you how many messages have gone undelivered between my friends and I when we used to use MSN messenger exclusively (even happens once or twice o…

I have a fair amount of experience with MSNP, and it is the exact opposite of P2P. Some things like file transfers will sometimes use P2P if it's available.

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#73

Post by AJ007 »

wetsocket wrote: post #13

MS using Linux to run their business. That says it all. A company with more money than it knows what to do with, acting desperately to save itself from obsolescence. Skype was flawed from the outset, being non-transparent (about how the network is set up, turning machines into supernodes withtout permission, and the encryption they use). It's all closed. Why? You can't verify it's well-designed. Now it's worse. Do I…

If Skype is flawed, then to a certain degree so is Facebook, SMS messaging, Facetime, and the rest. Being able to sell your company for billions two times, keeping ownership of the underlying technical IP and suing the first buyer seems like a pretty shrewd business model to me.

Of course I wish everyone was using end-to-end encrypted audio, text, and video communication with onion routing in the middle. But we aren't there yet. Arguably because everyone with A-list business, marketing, and technical acumen would rather be a billionaire.

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#74

Post by trotsky »

ghshephard wrote: post #69
ay wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The brilliant and problematic property of the translation (and why I think it will catch up) is that it allows to easily make your today's problems someone else's problems five years down the road. Noone gives a ding about what happens in five years in one's network - let alone the larger internet. BTW, next time you talk with the "address-hiding security" fans, check what result they get from http://panopticlick.eff…

I'm one of those "address-hiding security" fans - I've architected and deployed more than 7 million (currently operational) IPv6 nodes, 100% of them in RFC 4193 space. We have many layers of security. Link Layer Security, Application Layer Security, Firewall Security, IPsec Security, App Transport Security in addition to the non-routability security. I've never understood security professional who turn their nose up…

Do you really NAT all those meters though? It seems much more likely to me that you only have one or two specialized ALG's running.

One to many NAT really makes an attackers life easier in a lot of ways - at least as far as computer networks that support active users. NAT makes it much easier to hide from flow analysis and IDS and the proliferation nat traversal and tunnels to escape NAT make it much harder to spot rogue traffic. Lets not forget the classes of attacks that private v4 space has eased like DNS rebinding and home router attacks.

It's interesting, the only network I knew of that was ip6, aggressively secured and that many nodes is DISA which definitely doesn't allow any public network traffic - and yet uses global address space.

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#75

Post by akuzi »

pbreit wrote: post #68
revelation wrote: post #6

Let me just make this very clear: you don't go from zero operating cost to multiple millions of hardware and colo space to do the very same thing, in a move so transparent that it needs security researchers to dig into your program to find out it has happened at all. I guess Skype (by extension, Microsoft) is growing interested in what people are speaking about. To get hold of that data you need to route it through y…

Aren't Skype supernodes more like DNS? Just telling the two parties how to connect with each other and then getting out of the middle?

Supernodes also have the ability to relay the VoIP traffic if the callers cannot form a P2p connection. More info here http://saikat.guha.cc/pub/iptps06-skype/

It would be a small change to the supernode logic to enable relaying of calls for wiretap requests.

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#76

Post by [deleted] »

ra wrote: post #50
wmf wrote: post #4

Something not mentioned by Ars is that the difference in cost between datacenter bandwidth and broadband has changed significantly in the last 10 years. Datacenter resources are now so cheap that P2P has little advantage. (I think the rise of cyberlockers are another manifestation of this trend.)

I hope Spotify hear you and follow suit

[deleted]

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#77

Post by snarkinatree »

AJ007 wrote: post #73
wetsocket wrote: post #13

MS using Linux to run their business. That says it all. A company with more money than it knows what to do with, acting desperately to save itself from obsolescence. Skype was flawed from the outset, being non-transparent (about how the network is set up, turning machines into supernodes withtout permission, and the encryption they use). It's all closed. Why? You can't verify it's well-designed. Now it's worse. Do I…

If Skype is flawed, then to a certain degree so is Facebook, SMS messaging, Facetime, and the rest. Being able to sell your company for billions two times, keeping ownership of the underlying technical IP and suing the first buyer seems like a pretty shrewd business model to me. Of course I wish everyone was using end-to-end encrypted audio, text, and video communication with onion routing in the middle. But we aren'…

Nothing wrong with what Skype did. He made his money. Good for him. The point is that Skype is not magic. It's something that can be replicated, with simplicity and transparency.

I agree, the greed factor is great. And one would imagine some of those with the skill to make a "Skype" might think "Why should I do this for free?" Then you also have the perfectionists, with the skills, who won't attempt to build something that cannot be "perfect". They love to say "It won't work."

Skype is not perfect. And it's very non-transparent. But people are using it.

Should the next Skype be free and open? Is it worth building? I think the answers will become evident going forward. I think communication over the internet is too important to be solely controlled by [insert unflattering description here].

But we shall see.

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#78

Post by snarkinatree »

mey wrote: post #67
SpiderX wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mumble requires a server.

I don't know of any truly distributed encrypted voice systems you can trust out there. Hosting your own server for a service seemed like the next rational way to solve the persons question.

Try not to think in terms of server and client being separate machines. Or thinking that a server needs to be complex or able to handle an unlimited number of nodes. It's possible to be both a client and a server. And that is in fact what Skype was doing. Some clients were also functioning as supernodes.

Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

#79

Post by zobzu »

muppetman wrote: post #18

Good to see the grsecurity patch getting a bit of publicity. I think for critical devices it's an essential patch, mostly because of it's integration with the PaX patch which is aimed at preventing many different types of memory overflow exploits.

You can use PaX standalone tho.

I'd like to know if they used GrSecurity's RBAC or if they just used the patch and that was that.

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