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Skype Open-Source Back In Action, Breaks v5.5

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  • Skype Open-Source Back In Action, Breaks v5.5

    Phoronix: Skype Open-Source Back In Action, Breaks v5.5

    After a several month hiatus, the individual(s) working to reverse-engineer Skype's binary client have successfully "deobfuscated" the Skype 5.5 release...

    Phoronix, Linux Hardware Reviews, Linux hardware benchmarks, Linux server benchmarks, Linux benchmarking, Desktop Linux, Linux performance, Open Source graphics, Linux How To, Ubuntu benchmarks, Ubuntu hardware, Phoronix Test Suite

  • #2
    I hope they establish web site of skype reverse engineered version in China, and they won't have to fear DMCA shits there ;-)

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    • #3
      I just don't get all this fear from MS/Skype: just host the thing outside the US and go ahead with your business. How do you think AnyDVD has been alive and well for all these years?

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      • #4
        Why do they care if their stuff's been reverse-engineered? People still have to pay Skype to make POTS calls regardless of which client's used.

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        • #5
          Re

          Originally posted by wswartzendruber View Post
          Why do they care if their stuff's been reverse-engineered? People still have to pay Skype to make POTS calls regardless of which client's used.
          Stealing Inteligence bla-bla-bla...

          This guys had problems last time when they did that, they risk again?

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          • #6
            Just for curiosity, is there any way to understand the protocol for less experienced programmers?

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            • #7
              is it safe or open source ?

              What is the difference between the skype binary in the article link and the official skype ?

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              • #8
                Originally posted by drev View Post
                What is the difference between the skype binary in the article link and the official skype ?
                They discovered that the Skype binary is internally separated into a "core" library (which handles the protocol) and the UI (written in Delphi); the core (what they call the "kernel") and the UI are written and compiled with different toolchains and only combined in the final link stage, this probably helper the RE effort. Since the core has been isolated it's in theory possible to use it to write a custom GUI or a plugin to use Skype in other IM clients; AFAICS they did not reverse engineered the protocol itself.
                I assume that the linked binary contains the annotated IDA database which will help understating what functions to call in order to login, start a call, etc.
                Of course the binary is only usable on win32; maybe the same work can be done on the Linux binary, but frankly I don't see the point (plus the Linux client is pretty much dead...)

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                • #9
                  REverse engineering efforts

                  As for moving the stuff to China: apparently, the efforts are done from within Russia, which is also rather lax regarding immaginary properties...

                  Now that the core .DLL has been extracted, we need to put a bounty and pay a few hackers so they can disassemble and reverse engineer the protocols used by this DLL, and have them publish specifications. (All done within a country where it is acceptable. So keeping in Russia or moving to China).

                  Then we need to pay a bunch of other independent guys to turn said specifications into an independent, clean room, LGPL (or BSD) licensed library (hosted in a country without software patents so microsoft can't go this route to shut them down).

                  From that point onward, it would be trivial to get pidgin plugins, support for any mobile device you can think of, etc.

                  I'm sure that there are enough interested people to pool the money to pay hackers and developpers for that.

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                  • #10
                    Originally posted by tettamanti View Post
                    They discovered that the Skype binary is internally separated into a "core" library (which handles the protocol) and the UI (written in Delphi); the core (what they call the "kernel") and the UI are written and compiled with different toolchains and only combined in the final link stage, this probably helper the RE effort. Since the core has been isolated it's in theory possible to use it to write a custom GUI or a plugin to use Skype in other IM clients; AFAICS they did not reverse engineered the protocol itself.
                    I assume that the linked binary contains the annotated IDA database which will help understating what functions to call in order to login, start a call, etc.
                    Of course the binary is only usable on win32; maybe the same work can be done on the Linux binary, but frankly I don't see the point (plus the Linux client is pretty much dead...)
                    It might be possible to engineer a way to wrap the DLL much like how ndiswrapper wraps Windows WLAN drivers so that a functioning Linux Skype client can be successfully built. If this core Skype DLL can be treated like a driver then the ndiswrapper style approach could work.

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