Pidgin SSL-certificate error

[David Woolley]

Carlijn Gerrits wrote:
> 
> I have read the FAQ on the pidgin side, but I don't understand the 
> instructions at all.

Microsoft have messed up a security feature of the site.  If you don't 
understand what you are doing, you should get someone you personally 
trust, and who is competent, to make the changes.  The mechanism in 
question is about giving you a high level of certainty that you are 
dealing with the actual MSN server.  You do not have that level of 
certainty that the information that you receive on this list or from the 
bug tracker is actually coming, unaltered, from those.

You need to make an informed risk assessment before following any 
instructions.

> I have not the faintest Idea what I should do about this. I tried 
> restarting both pidgin and the computer, but neither of these things 
> worked.

Restarting the computer is a sledge hammer approach, and generally will 
not work if the problem is a real problem introduced by a change made at 
either end, and in particular, in this case, one made at the remote end.

The official client was probably updated, securely, in advance of this 
change, and, as Microsoft don't approve of the use of third party, open 
source, clients, they probably don't care that they have broken access 
from Pidgin.

-- 
David Woolley
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