Chats on Skype could become accessible to police and intelligence agencies worldwide: between rumors and Skype’s denial, here is the situation.
After the private chats on Facebook being intercepted, also the conversations on Skype will be made available to the police and judicial authorities.
This is the news circulating for a few hours on the web, precisely since the Washington Post anticipated that the staff responsible for Skype would have decided not to conceal the chats carried out through the service which, apparently, is one of the most used tools by criminals.
At first, only chats would be able to fall under the scrutiny of the competent authorities, and then – in a later and perhaps still distant phase – also move to intercept Skype calls.
Moreover, the first data that can be passed to the authorities will undoubtedly be the access credentials and the credit card numbers used to recharge Skype credit.
The news is going around the world and putting the staunch defenders of online privacy on alert.
However, it should be noted that a post on the official Skype blog has recently been published explaining that the company does not intend to subject telephone calls or chats to interception.
It is also specified that the recent technical changes made to Skype’s architecture, immediately after the service was acquired by Microsoft, were implemented to provide a better service to its users and not, therefore, to prepare access for judicial authorities among Skype users’ conversations.
The denial, clear and quite detailed, should therefore put an end to the rumors on this matter but this does not quell the demands of police and intelligence agencies worldwide: it is in fact pointed out that the encryption system used by Skype is a very strong barrier for those who seek to limit and uncover the schemes of criminals, pedophiles and terrorists.
After all, it is no secret that many jihadists active online advise the community to use Skype itself for communicating safely.
On the other hand, it is true that such protection helps humanitarian association activists every day to carry out their missions.
A double-edged sword, therefore, which could become a resource for investigators but a danger for those who work for good.
Be the first to comment