GAIM Encryption

FredAkbar · Post by **FredAkbar** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 1:16 am

Reikon wrote:Can't someone sue AOL based on the Internet Privacy Act of 1995?

They're illegally eaves dropping on your private conversations. Next thing you know they'll be monitoring your e-mails.

If they hadn't included this in their EULA, then maybe. But the point of a license agreement is that they can make you agree to a bunch of stuff in order to use their service (if you refuse, then you aren't allowed to use the service); one of these things you must agree to is waiving any right to privacy, which I assume would include the Internet Privacy Act, though I haven't read that act or know what it says exactly.

BodhiGeek · Post by **BodhiGeek** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 4:19 am

The_Tick wrote: 2) the encryption for gaim isn't usable for us, or we'd use it. They need to separate their gui and their backend, along with other stuffs, in order for us to use it, as far as I know. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

Which GAIM encryption scheme are you refering to?

I'm not a coder, so I can't speak knowledably about any of them, but I would have thought that since gaim-encryption and gaim-e are plugins, they'd be reasonably well abstracted out from the gaim gui code.

Despite the obvious advantages of gaim-e using gpg, I really prefer the simplicity of gaim-encryption's ssl based encryption. Plus, it works with the Windows implementaion of gaim, where gaim-e does not.

At one point I had all my Windows friends switched over from Trillian to WinGAIM w/ gaim-encryption. No conversion necessary w/ the Linux folks. :-) Then I switched and lost my encrypted goodness. It's been worth it, though. Adium does truly rock. 'Course, some cross-platform encrypted goodness would make it rock all the more.

Post by **The_Tick** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 4:32 am

Last I had heard, the gui and the backend of the gaim encryption stuff was not separated.

zaudragon · Post by **zaudragon** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 5:22 am

The_Tick wrote:Last I had heard, the gui and the backend of the gaim encryption stuff was not separated.

Yes, that's probably true.

It's separate from Gaim itslef, but the encryption stuff has some GUI stuff in it too I think.

Post by **evands** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 6:07 am

AIM is welcome to publish the sent text of my encrypted and fully deniable OTR-protected messages...

MordEth · Post by **MordEth** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 11:26 am

out of curiousity...have any of the Adium devs taken a look at the gAIM encryption plugins, to see how feasible it would be to try to port those to work with Adium?

if it wouldn't be that difficult, in light of all the publicity AIM's new terms of service has been getting, i can imagine that there'd be demand for the encryption plugin.

Post by **evands** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 1:15 pm

As has already been stated in this thread in a couple places, Adium .8 will have built-in encryption via Off the Record Messaging.

zaudragon · Post by **zaudragon** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 4:31 pm

evands wrote:As has already been stated in this thread in a couple places, Adium .8 will have built-in encryption via Off the Record Messaging.

mordEth just wanted some compatibility; the Gaim users who have gaim-e or gaim-encryption won't be able to read OTR messages.

jmelloy · Post by **jmelloy** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 5:49 pm

There's an OTR plugin for gaim.

rootdaemon · Post by **rootdaemon** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 6:11 pm

I think including OTR is great but the other person has to have it and most people who use AIM are either clueless or don't care.

recursivejon · Post by **recursivejon** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 7:28 pm

Its less a way to read people's private conversations, and more so a way to make money.

Harvesting AIM transcripts is an ideal way to do effortless market research. Otherwise, why keep AIM a free service?

Either way, now that its in their TOS, you might as well assume that they're logging everything said across their servers. Very big-brotherish... it'd be nice to know that my AIM convo's were kept private.

MordEth · Post by **MordEth** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 12:21 am

right, as zaudragon interpreted my post, i was more curious about how difficult it would be to have compatibility with gaim-e or gaim-encryption. i'd already read the news about OTR.

although in the meantime, i think i'm definitely going to look into OTR.

zaudragon · Post by **zaudragon** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 12:25 am

OTR is really good

Good Job on it

wtmcgee · Post by **wtmcgee** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 1:24 am

Does simply enabling encryption to always be on via the accounts preferences encrypt all my messages? I doubt I'll ever actually use this feature, but I'm just curious....

bitwiseshiftleft · Post by **bitwiseshiftleft** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 1:26 am

(copy-pasted with minor editing from a similar rant)

The Slashdot article is pure FUD. First of all, the "new" terms of service are in fact a year old. Second, the section you quote is under "Content You Post". That is, you waive any right you may have to the privacy of information you post in a public forum. Big whoop.

The point of the TOS is that "works" such as posts are automatically copyrighted in the United States and in several other countries as well. Thus to safely make the content accessible in a worldwide forum, AOL feels they have to have a TOS like this.

I will quote from the AIM privacy policy:
-----
AOL does not read your private online communications when you use any of the communication tools offered as AIM Products. If, however, you use these tools to disclose information about yourself publicly (for example, in chat rooms or online message boards made available by AIM), other online users may obtain access to any information you provide.

Your AIM information, including the contents of your online communications, may be accessed and disclosed in response to legal process (for example, a court order, search warrant or subpoena), or in other circumstances in which AOL has a good faith belief that AIM or AOL are being used for unlawful purposes. AOL may also access or disclose your AIM information when necessary to protect the rights or property of AIM or AOL, or in special cases such as a threat to your safety or that of others.
-----
Slightly sketchy, perhaps; they may have a loophole in there somewhere. But it's short of "all your base are belong to us".

Now, if you want to hide your stuff on AIM anyway, the best solution is... don't use AIM. Use Jabber or something. But OTR is a good stopgap.

Personally, I currently use AIM for all of "Hey, want to go to on a Filipe's run?". I don't care if AIM reproduces or globally rebroadcasts this in violation of their privacy policy. So whatever. But I'm going to get OTR anyway, if nothing else to encourage more widespread use.

Mike Hamburg

LeMignonBiscuit · Post by **LeMignonBiscuit** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 5:55 pm

Your AIM information, including the contents of your online communications, may be accessed and disclosed in response to legal process (for example, a court order, search warrant or subpoena), or in other circumstances in which AOL has a good faith belief that AIM or AOL are being used for unlawful purposes.

Makes sense to me. That's true of almost anything these days, it seems (disclosure via court order or warrant/subpoena).

Personally, I don't care if AOL/AIM wants to read my conversations. I don't think they should be able to use it against me, but it's well within their right to monitor activity on their network and their services, as has been said before.

If privacy is a big issue, then maybe you shouldn't be discussing your latest drug deal on AIM.

librarian · Post by **librarian** » Tue Mar 15, 2005 1:36 am

Demand Royalties.

"Mr. Huggy" is going to be lonely.

cocoaforge

GAIM Encryption

What would you do if AOL published your AIM logs?

RE: gAIM encryption

AOL doesn't read your IMs.

And the winner is...