Secure Messaging - an EFF review

Very Interesting. This is NOT in the basics. However it is worth noting. Many if not most of us use chat/messaging of some sort every day. We often consider those conversations private. Unfortunately they are often no more private than a discussion in a crowded bar or party. It will take some effort for others to listen in, but its far from private. The EFF has done a high level basic overview of a great many messaging services and programs available today. Then they put their findings into a chart (HERE). Go look, read carefully, tell me what you think. The interesting notes I picked up on in my first read through were: 1) Gchat sucks for security 2) The various i-Apps are surprisingly not as bad 3) Adium and Pidgin, old standbys for me from my last job, really are very good, of course the server back end needs to be secure as well..... using them with google chat will not give you the same results. Take-away: for most of us out there, there is not a lot of choice. Your average person does not run their own XMPP server. They want their data accessible from one tool, and they want to use the same service their friends use. For those of us tasked with running secure environments, you have to think about where you will spend your resources. Your time is not limitless and unless you really lucky, neither is your budget. Read it over, think on how it affects you, and in all likelihood, go back to what you were doing before.