Skype – IP will now be hidden by default to avoid attacks

Skype announced it will hide the user’s IP address, the new security feature is enabled by default in the latest update provided by the company.

Skype now hides users’ IP addresses, a measure implemented to protect them against attacks from online trolls.

Skype announced the security feature this week in a blog post, the feature is enabled by default in the latest update provided by the company.

Previously, it was quite easy to obtain the IP address of a Skype user when knowing the target’s Skype name, and target it. Online there are many websites, the so-called ‘resolvers,’ that can reveal the IP address of a Skype user.

“What’s changed is that over the past year, a number of services have emerged to help snoops and ne’er-do-wells exploit this vulnerability to track and harass others online. For example, an online search for “skype resolver” returns dozens of results that point to services (of variable reliability) that allow users to look up the Internet address of any Skype user, just by supplying the target’s Skype account name.” wrote Brian Krebs in a blog post back 2013.

“Skype is fully committed to delivering as safe and secure of an experience as possible to our customers. We have recently introduced the ability to hide a Skype user’s IP address and we’ve set this as a default status in the latest versions of Skype.” states Skype.

According to the company, the new security measure aims to protect online gamers, the experts at Skype observed that when people lose major online battles or matches use to launch a distributed denial of service attack knocking their rivals offline.

Now If you want to hide your address make sure you are using the latest version of Skype.

Pierluigi Paganini

(Security Affairs – Skype, privacy)