Skype: you can check in - but you can never leave
Users of the popular Skype technology may be disconcerted to learn that they are unable to delete their account.
If you have a Skype account on a work laptop for example, and leave the company; they are then able to access all your ‘private’ information and contacts.
Skype’s free internet telephony or VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol), Instant Messaging and video conferencing software is used by over 300 million people worldwide including many businesses, who can remove information from their profile, but not their actual account or user name.
When contacted by the NBR about why users are unable to delete their accounts, Max Wolf from the Office of the President of Skype responded:
“Unfortunately, for technical and security reasons, deleting a username is not possible. In order to prevent someone else from registering with the same username -- an act that could lead to identity theft.”
Users need to completely uninstall the program from their computer to fully prevent others accessing it from that computer. Skype’s policy also has the happy incidental effect of boosting total user numbers by including inactive accounts.
Social networking site Facebook had a similar no-deleting-your-account policy until February this year, when they caved to mounting public pressure and allowed users to contact the website to request permanent deletion of their accounts.
Skype was started by entrepreneurs Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis in 2003 after starting their first peer to peer file sharing venture, KaZaA n 2001. Skype was then acquired by eBay in September 2005 for $2.6 billion and currently has net revenue of USD$126 million.
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Comments
Your sensational headline is
Your sensational headline is misleading. Skype can and will delete user accounts; I've had them do it for me before. However, no username can ever be reused, because if my old username were reused by someone else, they could impersonate me. A Skype username is the only thing that uniquely identifies me - it makes perfect sense that they not allow its reuse.
Skype will delete user accounts completely upon request, since they are obligated to by the EU Directives. But a username is not an account - basically, they get to keep a record of the fact that they've deleted an account, while having purged the account itself entirely.
Dear anonymous
I have personally tried to delete a user account repeatedly and had no luck doing so - I can email you the correspondence with customer service if you like.
I would also reiterate that when contacted, Skype confirmed that you are unable to delete an account.
Kind regards,
Mitchell
Correct, Delete is Impossible
Mitchell, You are correct, it is absolutely impossible to delete a Skype account. The excuse Skype gives, "to prevent identity theft" is a red herring. There is no more danger of someone stealing my identity by re-registering my name after I delete it than there is if they happen to register it before I do - I am absolutely certain that I am not the only James Watson in the world, and you are not the only Mitchell Hall in the world, so how could this possibly be a problem?
There are two reasons that Skype will not delete user accounts; the first is marketing-driven, because never deleting an account allows them to go around with their ridiculous crowing about having "309 million user accounts", when in fact the actual number of Skype USERS is some 10% of that number; the other is practical, because Skype has absolutely NO Customer Support, and No Technical Support, they have no one to actually do the deleting!
Thanks for publicizing this issue which a lot more people need to be made aware of.
If I create a user account
If I create a user account "joe" and use it, get on people's contact lists, and so on, then delete the account, if someone else re-registers "joe" then they will assume all the authorization statuses that the previous "joe" had. This all has to do with the fact that Skype doesn't keep central databases of authorization relationships, only the users themselves do.
This is a really common p2p problem of trust, and isn't limited to Skype. (The same problem comes up in auction-house p2p applications with pseudonymous bidding.) So, really, they do have a point about the identity theft problem.
I don't dispute that their customer service is awful, but that isn't why they're saying that they can't "delete" a once-used username. It doesn't stop them from deleting all the account records. I have had one account deleted, so I know that they can and will do it, but it takes some persistence.
Uninstalling Skype
The hell with the account, somebody kindly tell me how to uninstall the friggin' thing from my computer.
Well, I guess they should be
Well, I guess they should be able to delete the account (meaning remove everything associated with the account except for the username) and still be able to not assign that username to others in future.
the next hot topic: INTERNET PRIVACY
interesting, finally you business people are picking up on this most important issue: the privacy policies of those who have all our data! yes people wake up! it's a huge issue! google knows everything about you and they've been ranked worst on privacy
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6740075.stm
here a funny story
http://www.stevenmansour.com/en/writings/2007/jul/23/2342/2504_steps_to_...
Msn , wlm beta, aim, yahoo
Msn , wlm beta, aim, yahoo messenger, gogle talk are much better than skype, icq wont let you cancel your account just like Skype, skype isn't secure, it's very propietary so no one knows about the encryption used, some people claim calls ans chats can be eavesdroped, phone calls are EXPENSIVE, use gtalk or wlm, at least you can get a mail address so in future they will remain the standard and integrate offline messages into emails, and free, skype is overpriced, its a business, and the most important NO ACCOUNT DELETION possible, they will store your data forlive
Adverts!!!
I installed skype 2 weeks ago and i started getting advertising slowing the computer down. they are not pop ups they open a new tab! I deleted skype to stop the advertising and to put my computer back to how it was but the adverts have not stopped. How do i stop them can any one help!
How to cancel my skype account ?
I have found this company is charging me for call that are not made, and auto-recharging my account without my permission. There is no phone number, e-mail address or live chat in the help or customer support section. I'm afraid it may get worse with my credit card information they have.
skype numbers transferred to all phone numbers on interner
I downloaded Skype a week ago.
I use the internet to find phone numbers but find now that every phone number on the internet turns into a skype number with a skype click -on.
What do I need to do to stop this, so that numbers will appear as regular phone numbers again?
I have turned skype off but it has not reversed the action
To set up a Skype phone system with PrettyMay Skype PBX
I would like to say Skype is great communication for business.
Since Skype moves to business communication area, there are many opitons for business that can use Skype such as Skype PBX for Windows, Skype for Sip, Skype for asterisk.
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