skype, the downside of p2p (part 2)

the skype p2p story continues, as mr. blog examines skype's privacy policy / eula, compares it to wikipedia's trusted computing definition and draws an analogy with microsofts next-generation secure computing base (formerly known as paladium).

Letting Skype use my computer to facilitate my own communications is one thing. But it is an entirely different matter to grant permission for Skype to use my private property to facilitate the communications of strangers, communications to which I am not a party. Forgetting this discrepency (which itself seems somewhat dubious), the fact is with Skype as it is today, your computer can become a hub (Supernode) and carry the conversations of others, without your explicit knowledge or active consent. The parallels to Palladium are many. In both cases, a big brother in the sky tells us whose computer we can trust, as well as when and how we should trust it. And all the protocols and algorithms are secret, not exposed to peer review or the kind of extensive public scrutiny required to affirm the security of the design.