Hidden Process Installed by Skype to Monitor Your Computer!

Posted by Jason on

October 2, 2007

As far as I can see, this is one of the most serious accusations addressed to Skype as the president of Dynamic Internet Technology accuses the application of censoring certain computer activities. Bill Xia is a provider of specialized software which helps the local Internet consumers bypass the governments’ filters and access the restricted websites. In case you didn’t know, the Chinese authorities are very exigent when it comes to the content accessed by the local users so they are trying anything it is possible to restrict certain websites. Sometimes, the government demands the help of the Internet pages or software solutions in order to do that, Skype being only one of those selected.

Bill Xia sustains Skype supports the government in censoring the content and moreover, it installs a hidden process on users’ computer which blocks certain words from being sent over the Internet. It all started when Skype redirected the users to Skype.tom.com, a website created in collaboration with Tom.com which is rumored to be used for tracking users on the Internet. Moreover, the Chinese user said for WebProNews that Skype puts a process called ‘contentfilter.exe’ on consumers’ systems, blocking certain words such as ‘dalai lama’ from being sent on the web.

“We’re sure it’s not a redirection from the firewall of the Chinese government but from Skype itself,” Bill Xia said for the source mentioned above.

Skype refused to comment on the reports but according to Bill Xia, the company detected that he uses the VoIP application to communicate with his clients in order to help them bypass the filters so it decided to redirect the users to the new portal and install that hidden executable file. However, these are serious accusations if we think that the company doesn’t mention anything about a secret process to monitor the computer activity in the privacy policy published on its official page.