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Skype backdoor confirmation

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Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#101

Post by X4 »

aclevernickname wrote: post #87
X4 wrote: post #36

* Can you please recommend a cross-platform alternative? I only know of Gnome-Empathy/KDE-Telepathy and Pidgin that utilize XMPP's voice and video features. I've found this: http://octro.com/octrotalk.php which lacks a linux client, but appears to be solid and has a web-client too.

http://yate.null.ro fully replaces Skype functionality (client and server), and works under mac/windows/linux.

Thanks a lot for sharing!

I hope they do more marketing and seo. I didn't find Yate, even after extended web searches.

Congrats to the developers, I'll definitely try this one out!

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#102

Post by throwawaykf2 »

mtgx wrote: post #29
nr0mx wrote: post #19

This is the company currently running ads positioning itself as a company that holds privacy dear. "At Microsoft, we take our responsibilities for protecting your privacy very seriously. It’s a priority across all our businesses, and an area where we continue to work closely with others throughout academia, government and industry." http://blogs.windows.com/ie/b/ie/archive/2013/04/22/consumer... "Your Privacy is Our…

That's the most annoying thing about Microsoft's campaigns. Sure they may be slightly better in some areas than Google, but overall they are just as bad, or worse than Google when it comes to privacy. Maybe I'd get it if those campaigns came from Mozilla or DuckDuckGo (even though they are still done in poor taste, and resemble too much negative political campaigns), but Microsoft? I just can't take them seriously in…

Can you enumerate the ways in which Microsoft is "just as bad or worse than Google when it comes to privacy"?

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#103

Post by chalst »

jlgreco wrote: post #98
buster wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you wouldn't be drugged :(

Enough alcohol will leave me unable to recall several of my longer passwords. I find it hard to believe that they have a drug that will 1) not trigger that, 2) not leave a hangover of any sorts, 3) render me entirely unable to remember the incident, 4) make me inclined to tell them the password. That would basically be a wonder drug, the ultimate truth serum.

There are drugs for some of those things...

1) Barbiturates induce a hypnotic state that has widely been reported to improve subjects ability to recall details. Published work on human subjects more or less dried up in the early 70s for ethical grounds (cf. http://ist-socrates.berkeley.edu/~kihlstrm/exhumed.htm "There is, unfortunately, a virtual lack of controlled clinical studies on the accuracy of hypnotically refreshed memories."), but I bet the military have classified knowledge. Also, there's been quite a bit of published work on recall under barbiturates in dogs and rats.

2) So, you wake up with a hangover, a blackout, some bruises, and an attractive stranger in your bed. What do you assume?

3) There are drugs to suppress memories. Barbiturates, again, make it hard to recall details of the trance. Also, see http://mbldownloads.com/0205CNS_Pitman.pdf

4) Barbiturates, yet again, are well-documented to improve compliance, though at the expense of an apparent willingness to cause you to believe what you think will please the interrogator rather than what you would normally believe to be true.

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#104

Post by pyre »

mtgx wrote: post #92
OldSchool wrote: post #91

Nothing else explains why Microsoft would pay US $8 Billion for Skype. Profit margins are either exactly zero or near-zero for every call; this is not 1995 when telco call termination was 20x more expensive. The simplest explanation is that reliable incumbent Microsoft was hired in some way to conveniently consolidate Skype. With as many channels through which Microsoft does business with the US government, favorable…

NSA was already ready to pay billions of dollars for a Skype eavesdropping solution [1]. One could wonder if that's one way Microsoft wanted to recover some of the cost of their investment, and why they were so willing to pay twice as much as Google wanted to pay. I mean what company outbids another by 2x/$4 billion for a company with not that much revenue and profit? [1] - http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/12/nsa…

  | One could wonder if that's one way Microsoft
  | wanted to recover some of the cost of their
  | investment
You could wonder, but it would seem difficult to hide $1 billion in revenue for a publicly traded company.

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#105

Post by pyre »

jlgreco wrote: post #97
mtgx wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the most annoying thing about Microsoft's campaigns. Sure they may be slightly better in some areas than Google, but overall they are just as bad, or worse than Google when it comes to privacy. Maybe I'd get it if those campaigns came from Mozilla or DuckDuckGo (even though they are still done in poor taste, and resemble too much negative political campaigns), but Microsoft? I just can't take them seriously in…

> resemble too much negative political campaigns Seriously, outside of politics they are the most negative ads I've ever seen. Even rival dishsoap or gym ads never get that extreme; nothing else compares. Did they actually hire a political advertising team or something?

IIRC, the Scroogled campaign was put forward by an ex-political campaign guy.

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#106

Post by jlgreco »

chalst wrote: post #103
jlgreco wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Enough alcohol will leave me unable to recall several of my longer passwords. I find it hard to believe that they have a drug that will 1) not trigger that, 2) not leave a hangover of any sorts, 3) render me entirely unable to remember the incident, 4) make me inclined to tell them the password. That would basically be a wonder drug, the ultimate truth serum.

There are drugs for some of those things... 1) Barbiturates induce a hypnotic state that has widely been reported to improve subjects ability to recall details. Published work on human subjects more or less dried up in the early 70s for ethical grounds (cf. http://ist-socrates.berkeley.edu/~kihlstrm/exhumed.htm "There is, unfortunately, a virtual lack of controlled clinical studies on the accuracy of hypnotically ref…

> So, you wake up with a hangover, a blackout, some bruises, and an attractive stranger in your bed. What do you assume?

Unless I was out clubbing, taking drugs without knowing what they were, (I am not in the habit of doing this...), I would get myself to a hospital and probably call the police. I'm fairly familiar with what truly excessive amounts of alcohol will do to me and that list of symptoms does not include truly blacking out without the presence of some other pretty extreme symptoms. Of course I have not gotten this drunk in years because I am an adult who knows how to moderate my own drink intake, so I would assume I was drugged regardless (if nothing else, had my drinks spiked)...

Regardless, any drug-induced blackouts that leave you coherent enough to participate in complex tasks (including recall) are unreliable at best; there is a strong chance that the victim will remember that something bad happened. Honestly it would be better to just give up on the "black out" part, drug the guy conventionally, then beat the password out of him. You will undoubtedly have better results by giving yourself fewer restrictions.

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#107

Post by pyre »

buster wrote: post #70
GhotiFish wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't really think of how one gets around that link. I'm not sure what you mean.

The point is that noone should act surprised because the laws already demand that communications can be intercepted and read. Of course that excludes GPG (or pasting encrypted text into your skype chat). And that is only true as long as your law enforcement doesn't have you on surveillance. Or unless you can be 100% sure that the NSA really really really can't crack your encryption. And even Bruce Schneier isn't sure…

It really depends on what you're doing. The NSA doing something like breaking GPG/PGP encryption would be like breaking the Enigma during WW2. You don't want to tip your hand to your opponents that you can read their communications. IIRC, the Allies sometimes had to not act on information that could save lives because those actions would reveal how much they knew to the Axis powers. So basically you only end up acting on really valuable information.

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#108

Post by pyre »

GigabyteCoin wrote: post #83

Why is everybody so worried that Skype is visiting URLs you posted in their chat box? They're probably just checking them for Malware was my first thought and is still my only.

If the URL is scraped from the message as it passes through Microsoft's servers, then Microsoft's servers have direct access to your chat text (i.e. not an encrypted channel from client-to-client).

If the URL is sent from the receiving client to Microsoft for analysis, then Microsoft has a list of all URLs that have been communicated to you via Skype.

Either of these scenarios chips away at / tears down the idea that Skype is a 'secure' communications platform.

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#109

Post by jlgreco »

pyre wrote: post #105
jlgreco wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> resemble too much negative political campaigns Seriously, outside of politics they are the most negative ads I've ever seen. Even rival dishsoap or gym ads never get that extreme; nothing else compares. Did they actually hire a political advertising team or something?

IIRC, the Scroogled campaign was put forward by an ex-political campaign guy.

Oh wow, you're right: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Penn#Microsoft_Corporation

Re: Skype backdoor confirmation

#110

Post by declan »

mtgx wrote: post #29
nr0mx wrote: post #19

This is the company currently running ads positioning itself as a company that holds privacy dear. "At Microsoft, we take our responsibilities for protecting your privacy very seriously. It’s a priority across all our businesses, and an area where we continue to work closely with others throughout academia, government and industry." http://blogs.windows.com/ie/b/ie/archive/2013/04/22/consumer... "Your Privacy is Our…

That's the most annoying thing about Microsoft's campaigns. Sure they may be slightly better in some areas than Google, but overall they are just as bad, or worse than Google when it comes to privacy. Maybe I'd get it if those campaigns came from Mozilla or DuckDuckGo (even though they are still done in poor taste, and resemble too much negative political campaigns), but Microsoft? I just can't take them seriously in…

It would be interesting to see a comparison of Bing search and ads privacy vs. Google's in the same areas. My hunch is that Microsoft would not come out ahead.
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