Are Chats--text, audio, video---secure?

I am concerned because my wife is an important university official and I
sometimes communicate with her by chats, as well as with others. Some time
ago, someone claimed to me that they had potentially embarrassing personal
information obtained from a chat through a work connection, and I now
wonder if all Live Messenger communications are secure.

"TheCroW" <> wrote in
microsoft.public.windows.live.messenger:

>> I am concerned because my wife is an important university official
>> and I sometimes communicate with her by chats, as well as with
>> others. Some time
>> ago, someone claimed to me that they had potentially embarrassing
>> personal information obtained from a chat through a work connection,
>> and I now wonder if all Live Messenger communications are secure.
>>
>
> Mmm, depends what the level of secure for you is?
> WLM chats are secure by default. In normal use it's only vissible for
> the people who chat together.
> But ... I'm sure that it can be monitored by some kind of hacking. For
> that matter, everything on the internet can be hacked if you want to.
> Having said that, a healty sence of small paranoia is always good,
> keeps you on your toes when it concerns safety. But with normal use
> and people keeping their PC's safe, I think there is no concern for
> security been broken. One tip though: people (mostly direct colleagues
> of family members) do claim that chats are monitored ... while in fact
> it's very easy to look into ones chat history when a PC in unattended.
> So, disabeling message history is always a good option then.

I know about message histories.

I am talking about the video/audio/text stream between hosts, where someone
taps into a node (routers/gateways) in between. For instance, suppose an
info tech group of a large university is ordered (or induced by some other
means) to monitor a line to a certain IP address within the university
network in order to try to get embarrassing or useful information through a
WLM connection of any kind. Assume that there is NO workplace policy
prohibition of the use of that line for business and personal matters, and
that there is EVERY expectation of privacy, just as you might go into a
workplace restroom with all reasonable expectation that cameras are not
installed to examine every detail of your private anatomy or the use of its
functions.

Now, in the United States, such eavesdropping ("monitoring") without a
court order would likely be illegal, maybe even criminal...it's certainly
unethical, unless perhaps there is a notice posted everywhere in the
workplace that there is no expectation of privacy on telephone or the
Internet (web, email, audio/video conversations) or the use of your bodily
functions. In other words, you might expect every orifice can be probed
with such a policy.

Now consider that I am located in a developing country, not exactly known
for its standards at all, and laws only apply to the common man on the
street, and only when a policeman decides the laws arbitrarily apply. It's
not exactly the wild frontier here, but it's also not a place where you can
assume that no one is interested or cares what you do. I am a foreigner
here in this developing country, and my wife is a native, and she's made
some enemies of the losers here because of the power she has wielded
responsibly in bringing them down. It's not paranoid to say that they are
HIGHLY motivated to bring her down hard, and in the meanest, most lowdown
ways possible. Trying to bribe a tech to tap into an unsecure WLM
connection---if it is not secure----is the least of the lowdown things they
might try. If it's too much trouble to eavesdrop in real time, who'd
really bother?

Now as to the level of security/encryption, I am assuming that the level of
hacking required to break into a secured video stream would be that
required by a government with huge resources, not by some semi-clever
hacker and part-time virus writer living in the developing world who
happens to make a salary working an info tech gig.

Greetings,

There's no encryption going on in Messenger (not text, not video, not audio) besides the SSL
used for authentication when you login.

--
Jonathan Kay
Microsoft MVP - Windows Live Messenger
MSN Messenger/Windows Messenger
MessengerGeek Blog: http://www.messengergeek.com
Messenger Resources: http://messenger.jonathankay.com
(c) 2008 Jonathan Kay - If redistributing, you must include this signature or citation
--


"Five By Five" <> wrote in message news:Xns9B367B1C5143B5x55x5@207.46.248.16...
>
> I am concerned because my wife is an important university official and I
> sometimes communicate with her by chats, as well as with others. Some time
> ago, someone claimed to me that they had potentially embarrassing personal
> information obtained from a chat through a work connection, and I now
> wonder if all Live Messenger communications are secure.
>