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- <br />
-<b><big>About SILC</big></b>
-<br /> <br />
-SILC (Secure Internet Live Conferencing) is a protocol which provides
-secure conferencing services on the Internet over insecure channel. SILC
-superficially resembles IRC, although they are very different internally.
-They both provide conferencing services and have almost the same set of
-commands. Other than that, they are nothing alike. The SILC is secure and
-the network model is entirely different compared to IRC.
-<br /> <br />
-SILC provides security services that any other conferencing protocol does
-not offer today. The most popular conferencing service, IRC, is entirely
-insecure. If you need secure place to talk to some person or to group of
-people over the Internet, IRC or any other conferencing service, for that
-matter, cannot be used. Anyone can see the messages and their contents in
-the IRC network. And the most worse case, some is able to change the
-contents of the messages. Also, all the authentication data, such as,
-passwords are sent plaintext in IRC.
-<br /> <br />
-SILC is much more than just about `encrypting the traffic'. That is easy
-enough to do with IRC and SSL hybrids, but even then the entire network
-cannot be secured, only part of it. SILC provides security services, such
-as sending private messages entirely secure; no one can see the message
-except you and the real receiver of the message. SILC also provides same
-functionality for channels; no one except those clients joined to the
-channel may see the messages destined to the channel. Communication
-between client and server is also secured with session keys and all
-commands, authentication data (such as passwords etc.) and other traffic
-is entirely secured. The entire network, and all parts of it, is secured.
-We are not aware of any other conferencing protocol providing same
-features at the present time.
-<br /> <br />
-SILC has secure key exchange protocol that is used to create the session
-keys for each connection. SILC also provides strong authentication based
-on either passwords or public key authentication. All authentication data
-is always encrypted in the SILC network. Each connection has their own
-session keys, all channels have channel specific keys, and all private
-messages can be secured with private message specific keys.
-<br /> <br />
-
-<b>Distribution</b>
-<br /> <br />
-The SILC is distributed currently in three different packages. The SILC
-Client package, the SILC Server package and the SILC Toolkit package. Each
-package has its intended audience.
-<br /> <br />
-- SILC Client package is intended for end users who are looking for a good
-and full featured SILC client. The SILC Client package currently includes
-Irssi-SILC client that supports all SILC features, themes and much more.
-It is curses based but has a possibility of adding various other frontends
-to it. The Irssi-SILC client's user interface is based on the Irssi client
-(see <a href="http://irssi.org/" class="normal">Irssi project</a>).
-<br /> <br />
-- SILC Server package is intended for system administrators who would like
-to run their own SILC server or SILC router. The package includes the
-actual server but not the client. If you are running a server and would
-like to connect it to the silc.silcnet.org router you can contact us.
-<br /> <br />
-- SILC Toolkit package is intended for developers and programmers who
-would like to create their own SILC based applications or help in the
-development of the SILC protocol. The actual development of the SILC is
-done in the Toolkit and all the other packages are based on the Toolkit
-releases. The Toolkit includes SILC Protocol Core library, SILC Crypto
-library, SILC Key Exchange (SKE) library, SILC Math library, SILC Modules
-(SIM) library, SILC Utility library, SILC Client library and few other
-libraries. It also includes the Irssi-SILC Client, another client as an
-example how to program with the Toolkit and the SILC Server.
-<br /> <br />
-
-<b>Licensing</b>
-<br /> <br />
-SILC is an Open Source (or Free Software) project and it has been released
-under the <a href="?page=copying" class="normal">GNU General Public License</a>. The SILC is free to use and everyone
-is allowed to freely redistribute and change the SILC under the terms of the
-GNU GPL. While there is no guarantee for the product, SILC is made as secure
-as possible. The fact that the software and the protocol is open for public
-analysis is a good thing for end user.
-<br /> <br />
-Specification of SILC protocol is available for anyone to look at. There
-exist four Internet Drafts that have been submitted to the <a
-href="http://www.ietf.org/" class="normal">IETF</a>. See <a
-href="?page=docs" class="normal">documentation page</a> for more information.
-<br /> <br />
-
-<b>Contact</b>
-<br /> <br />
-Feedback and comments are welcome. Bug reports should be sent to the
-development mailing list.
-<br /> <br />
-Development mailing list address:
-<a href="mailto:silc-devel@lists.sourceforge.net" class="normal">
-silc-devel@lists.sourceforge.net</a>
projects / silc.git / blobdiff