Gentoo Archives: gentoo-user

From: Mike Kazantsev <mk.fraggod@×××××.com>
To: gentoo-user@l.g.o
Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] Network message encryption
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 2009 03:39:11
Message-Id: 20090817093853.5f96b00f@malediction
In Reply to: [gentoo-user] Network message encryption by Xianwen Chen
1 On Mon, 17 Aug 2009 04:19:35 +0200
2 Xianwen Chen <xianwen.chen@×××××.com> wrote:
3
4 > I'm looking for a network message encryption method. Please kindly
5 > tell me if you know any Instant Messenger which supports encryption.
6 > Thank you very much!
7
8 I'm using gajim with TLS-enabled (transport-level encryption) connection
9 to the servers and built-in GPG plugin to encrypt messages, containing
10 some auth info, which I occasionally have to pass.
11 I believe pidgin also had support for such feature via one of the
12 standard plugins.
13
14 TLS is widely-deployed on XMPP (jabber) servers, but encryption ends at
15 the server in question, so it can intercept / mangle the messages, so it
16 might be good idea to prefer large and reliable servers to
17 possibly-compromised or malicious small ones.
18 Furthermore, in case of XMPP, your (source) server is free to pass the
19 message in unencrypted form to destination server, so message can be
20 caught by any IP-sniffers on the route.
21 Then there's also remote client connection, which can be unencrypted
22 (no TLS/SSL) and likewise intercepted on TCP/IP level.
23
24 GPG encryption requires clients on both sides to support it, but has
25 benefit that all cryptographic operations are happening on client
26 machines, so server (or any intermediate host) is unable to spoof
27 conversation, provided the encryption (GPG) keys aren't compromised.
28
29 --
30 Mike Kazantsev // fraggod.net

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Replies

Subject Author
Re: [gentoo-user] Network message encryption Xianwen Chen <xianwen.chen@×××××.com>