<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Apr 19, 2012 at 4:37 PM, Ron Frazier (ALE) <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com">atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
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On 4/19/2012 8:17 AM, Michael Campbell wrote:
<blockquote type="cite"><br>A colleague of mine uses Ooma and raves about it. <br><div class="gmail_quote">
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<div>I use Skype dial-out (I can dial regular #'s with it), and it
works well enough for me. I'm on business in Belgium right now, and I
use it to call my home phone in Atlanta on the anemic hotel wifi, and
it works very well with voice. It also works moderately well with
video on a Skype-Skype call to home also.</div>
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<div>I don't have a Jihad against Microsoft, so I'll continue to use
Skype until a better valued option comes up, or it starts to suck. So
far neither have happened.</div>
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<div>I haven't tried Google Voice from my computer to regular # yet,
but I might try that in the next couple days.</div>
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Hi Michael and all,<br>
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I use both Microsoft and Linux products routinely, and don't have an
axe to grind for or against either. However, I thought I'd mention
this regarding Skype. Microsoft filed for a patent back in 2009 and it
was recently published regarding allowing the covert "wiretapping" (my
words) of VOIP calls. Now that they've bought Skype, I think you have
to assume that your Skype call could be monitored and recorded. Now,
it's supposed to be only legally authorized wiretapping, and I
understand that law enforcement sometimes has a need for that.
However, it used to be only the highly regulated telco that had access
to wiretap your calls. Now, it's a less regulated (I would say) mega
corporation that's routing the call, and one that's not intrinsically
in the phone business. I think that, if I needed VOIP for anything
remotely sensitive, and if I had an alternative that I could encrypt,
I'd avoid using Skype. I don't know precisely what that alternative is
though. Just my 2 cents.</div><div text="#000000" bgcolor="#ffffff"><br></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>Security concerns noted and appreciated. While I understand where you're coming from, (and each user is different), I don't use Skype for sensitive comms. Mainly business stuff between colleagues (and Skype is the standard where I work, so I more or less have to use it for that), and talks to my family about dull family stuff when I'm away from the house.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Given that Skype's data goes through a (large?) number of different routers, networks, and such before and after it hits Skype's/MS' servers, worrying about MS specifically recording my calls is actually the least of any worries I'd have (if I had any to begin with).</div>
<div><br></div><div>In short, I'm less concerned about THAT attack vector on my calling since I believe there are so many other easier ones*. And the NSA has all my data already.</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>
<br></div><div>* One that does give me slight pause is now MS owns the proprietary protocol specs for Skype. If I understand correctly, one of Skype's security features was that it has not yet been reverse engineered very well (or at all?). Perhaps that's wrong; I haven't really kept up with the progress along those lines.</div>
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