Skype's proprietary encryption technology is purportedly the bane of electronic spies at the NSA and GCHQ. But Skype owner, eBay, has quietly revealed it could rip out and replace the code at its core. Apparently the original Skype founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom, who now own Joltid, sold Skype to eBay. Yet when they sold it, they held on to what they claimed was their intellectual property rights to the encryption methodology of the Skype protocal. So in order to eBay to continue to use the product they purchased, they had to license out the Encryption Protocols from Joltid on a year basis to boot. eBay has mad it clear that they believe the Skype endeavor was a strategic and financial failure. But because they could not make enough money recently, Joltid threatened to no renew their license of the Encryption Protocols. eBay, now furious, claimed that they were just being nice, but in reality didn't feel Joltid had any intellectual property rights and are now going to take them to court to prove it. In the meantime, eBay has set their internal development staff to create their own Encryption Protocols in case their legal battle fails, so that they can replace Joltid's version.

Additionally, the NSA and other intelligence agencies have put out a "bounty" to anyone who can determine a way to circumnavigate Skype's Encryption Protocols so that these agencies can "listen in" on calls.

It looks like Joltid is battling a war on two fronts...wonder if they can hold out.

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