Researchers ID Skype, BitTorrent Users 180
Posted
by
Soulskill
from the cross-contamination dept.
from the cross-contamination dept.
itwbennett writes "Researchers have figured out a way to link online Skype users to their activity on peer-to-peer networks like BitTorrent. The team was able to sift out the nodes through which Skype calls are routed and determine the user's real IP address by sniffing the packets. To correlate the identified Skype users with files shared on BitTorrent, the researchers built tools to collect BitTorrent file identifiers, a BitTorrent crawler to collect IP addresses on the network and a verifier to match an online Skype user with an online BitTorrent user (PDF). 'As soon as the BitTorrent crawler detects a matching IP address, it signals the verifier, which immediately calls the corresponding Skype user and, at the same time, initiates a handshake with the BitTorrent client,' they wrote."
Packet sniffing (Score:2, Interesting)
Seeing as how this relies on packet sniffing of an unaware party's network traffic, I'm pretty sure any application of this without a warrant would constitute wiretapping. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's my understanding of it.
Re:Privacy (Score:5, Interesting)
What's illegal about it? What federal or state statute have they violated?
Wiretapping. Conspiracy to collect information assumed to be private, via technological means.
Robocalling (the Skype phone, duh). Wardialing (same thing).
They've violated a boatload of communications regulations... and the fact that they did it as part of a multi-researcher study means it was premeditated, and they conspired to do it. Conspiracy to commit a misdemeanor is a felony.
The problem here would be that anyone who tries to have them arrested and/or takes them to civil court will be presumed guilty of something, because why else would we care if someone can tie our online activities to our real-world identities?
Re:Moral of the story... (Score:4, Interesting)
I think this is the real issue here. It all has to be coming from problems with skype's security and nothing else. Skype should take this as a huge warning and encrypt their packet information NOW. I don't care what this is used for, people sniffing packets and being able to tell who someone is on a program like skype that is often left on 24/7 is a huge security risk for the person involved! This should NOT be happening and it's all skype's fault.
You guys are getting to hung up on the bit torrent aspect of this and should realize that it's really a major skype fuck up.
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