Quote from: Shannon on August 13, 2012, 05:12 amwindows has an nsa-controlled signing key in it, and the nsa likely gave money to microsoft to buy skype with and change the network architecture into something that can be wiretappedhttp://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/12/nsa_offers_billions_for_skype_pwnage/http://arstechnica.com/business/2012/05/skype-replaces-p2p-supernodes-with-linux-boxes-hosted-by-microsoft/Actually, unless this is some kind of pokerfaced long play, it's sort of comforting that Skype was using technology good enough to irk somebody. Cryptography for the win again. I'm not sure that somebody was actually the NSA though. I've said it before and I'll say it again, your regular police people are far too stupid to use surveillance software without severely compromising basic human rights of just about everybody. It's a product of their organizational structure rather than the individuals (although that may be too generous, maybe 'and' = 'rather than'), if they are given a tool then they will use it irrespective of the consequences. Any intelligence agency giving LE such services/tools would be making a major strategic miscalculation. This is because you've just given a bunch of people who are used to being entitled to using coercive force the ability to "do the right thing for the country" i.e. start a coup. Traditionally the police and the military are the most likely groups to initiate a coup, and the very first thing to be done is to whip the intelligence agencies into being cooperative (or dead). For another thing, it turns that intelligence organization into a target for every criminal organization. They are not so smart that the Mafia and Cartels cannot reach out and touch them if they so choose.This is one of the great irony's of the "check & balance" system of government so applauded by political scientists. The black market serves a critical role as part of that system, albeit unintentionally. You seriously do not want to live in society without any black market, it implies the State exercises such a degree of invasive control life for regular civilians is completely intolerable.