A secure democratic Net is a fundamental right

The findings unearthed and documented by NartVilleneuve in

Here we have a major software tool used to make telephone calls and send instant messages over the Internet, advertising secure end-to-end encryption, and widely touted by activists and dissidents as a safe way to communicate sensitive information, logging sensitive keywords and uploading entire transcripts of conversations to servers in China, which themselves are insecure. How insecure?

Villeneuve was able to view, download, and archive millions of private communications, ranging from business transactions to political correspondence, along with their identifying personal information.

Although some have mooted that Skype is equipped with a backdoor for intelligence, and that TOM-Skype in particular contained a Trojan Horse for the Chinese government, the company publicly denied these suspicions. Villeneuve’s research definitively shows these denials are untrue. Although Villeneuve’s trail runs cold at the doorstep of eight TOM-Skype servers in China, the underlying purpose of such widespread and systematic surveillance seems obvious. Dissidents and ordinary citizens are being systematically monitored and tracked.

comment : And elsewhere ? What about Russia, Algeria and other democracies that have also such controls on the internet ? Or even the Patriot Act in the US ? And if he can hack into the servers, why not any other cyberwarrior.

Leave skype dead if you want to have privacy and security. Because if you can't trust them there, where and when can you trust them ? Trust is not something that you can split. You trust or you don't. And that you have to earn, every day, anywhere anyhow whenever.