On Monday 31 August 2009, Alan Cox wrote: >On Sun, 30 Aug 2009 11:28:58 +0100 > >Marko Vojinovic <vvmarko@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: >> On Sunday 30 August 2009 09:20:59 Tim wrote: >> > On Sat, 2009-08-29 at 14:09 -0700, Joel Gomberg wrote: >> > > I thought Skype was P2P application >> > >> > Supposedly it is, but with closed source, you've no real idea what it's >> > going to do. Even hacking software to reverse engineer it may only >> > give you a partial picture, particularly if it's convoluted. >> >> Is there any initiative or attempts to reverse engineer its protocol? > >There have been but it uses every malware like trick of the book to self >encrypt and the like. With virtual machines it isn't of course quite so >safe any more. > >There are also some other awkward factors > >- The person who completely reverse engineers skype probably destroys it. > If you can write a skype client than the spammers can write skype spam > tools as well. > >- Skype appears to contain various law enforcement intercept facilities > judging by the evidence - although mostly circumstantial. > >- The Skype business model depends upon interoperability not working > (like early instant messaging systems), so you would expect a mix of > protocol changes and thermonuclear level legal responses if the work > was done in the USA or other countries with broken DMCA type laws. > >> programming... But surely *someone* does, is there any known attempt to >> do this? > >I would imagine anyone doing so is keeping fairly quiet - there is big >money on offer from the bad guys for skype trojans, intercepts and >clients, while anyone on the good side fiddling with it faces jail and >harrasment - a fine example of perverse economic incentives. > >Alan Absolutely spot on Alan. -- Cheers, Gene "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order." -Ed Howdershelt (Author) The NRA is offering FREE Associate memberships to anyone who wants them. <https://www.nrahq.org/nrabonus/accept-membership.asp> Nezvannyi gost'--khuzhe tatarina. [An uninvited guest is worse than the Mongol invasion] -- Russian proverb -- fedora-list mailing list fedora-list@xxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe: https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-list Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Communicate/MailingListGuidelines
