[AG-TECH] Secured or private AG sessions?

[Andrew Rowley]

Hi,

It is worth noting that without encryption, it is essentially impossible to be sure that no-one is listening.  If I join the same venue as you but turn on my firewall to stop outgoing data, I will see you, but you won't see me!

You can have an encrypted venue set up (or set up your own server and set up an encrypted venue).  This requires each participant to have a valid security certificate, which you trust (i.e. the anonymous certificates might not be enough), and then you can tell the venue server to only allow those participants to enter the venue, and set the venue as encrypted.  When a venue is encrypted, it tells your audio and video tools to use an encryption key.

What you can also do, then, is manually set an encryption key in the audio and video tools.  In vic, you can do this by clicking on "Menu" and then entering a key in the "Key:" box at the bottom, and then press "Enter" on your keyboard.  In rat, you can do this by clicking on "Options..." and then selecing "Security" from the "Categories" and then entering the key, click "enabled" and then "Apply".  You then need to communicate the key (or keys - you can use different keys in vic and rat) to the other party (perhaps by phoning them).  Note that this doesn't stop other people from coming in to the same venue, but if they do, they won't see or hear you (and I don't think you will see or hear them either).

Andrew :)

---------------------------------------------------------

   Andrew G D Rowley
   Senior Development Officer

   Research Computing Services
   The University of Manchester
   Devonshire House, Oxford Road
   Manchester, M13 9PL
 
   t :  +44 (0) 161 275 0685
   e :  Andrew.Rowley at manchester.ac.uk
   w :  www.manchester.ac.uk/researchcomputing
 
---------------------------------------------------------


> -----Original Message-----
> From: ag-tech-bounces at lists.mcs.anl.gov [mailto:ag-tech-
> bounces at lists.mcs.anl.gov] On Behalf Of David Allingham
> Sent: 07 July 2010 13:57
> To: ag-tech at mcs.anl.gov
> Subject: [AG-TECH] Secured or private AG sessions?
> 
> Am I right in thinking that you can't really make a secure/private AG
> session or venue (i.e., one with control over who can join as a
> participant)?  I see the "encrypted room" in the APAG Institutions
> Lobby, but from what I can find that seems to mean that you can only
> view the audio and video streams by connecting to that venue, via the
> AG client... is that right?
> 
>  The intended use is for job interviews (and perhaps thesis defense),
> so it would be sufficient, in the first instance, to simply know that
> no-one is connecting without the other participants knowing, but I
> just wondered if it's possible to go further.  Any advice or
> corrections welcome!
> 
>  David
> 
> ---
> David Allingham
> Research Technical Officer
> CARMA
> School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences
> The University of Newcastle
> Callaghan, NSW 2308, Australia
> David.Allingham at newcastle.edu.au
> Tel.: (02) 492 16531
> Fax:  (02) 492 16898