pidgen chat question

[Brian Morrison]

On Fri, 27 May 2011 22:06:12 +0100
David Woolley <forums at david-woolley.me.uk> wrote:

> Brian Morrison wrote:
> > On Fri, 27 May 2011 01:49:14 -0500
> > "Leo Rosenstein" <spinnner at frontiernet.net> wrote:
> > 
> >> Does anyone know if it is possible for pidgin chats to be monitored or
> >> "seen" by another system while they are taking place? In otherwords
> >> can pidgin chats be "eavesdropped" ??
> > 
> > Yes, they can be because the data is being passed between participants
> > by a server that is under 3rd party control.
> 
> But this applies to any client for the service, not just to Pidgin.

Indeed it does.

> 
> The level of protection is likely to vary from service to service, but 
> all of them are vulnerable to a dishonest service operator.  Some may 
> even profile your messages to target advertising.

Quite likely, which is why my suggestion for preventing this is service
neutral and under the control of the end user not the service provider.

> 
> > If you want plausible deniability one way of achieving that is using
> > Off The Record (OTR). Have a look at http://www.cypherpunks.ca/otr for
> > more information.
> 

-- 

Brian Morrison

                "I am not young enough to know everything"
                                                          Oscar Wilde