Microsoft Notification Protocol

Microsoft Notification Protocol (MSNP, also known as the Mobile Status Notification Protocol) is an instant messaging protocol developed by Microsoft for use by the Microsoft Messenger service and the instant messaging clients that connect to it, such as Skype (from 2014 to 2019), and the earlier Windows Live Messenger, MSN Messenger, Windows Messenger, and Microsoft Messenger for Mac. Third-party clients such as Pidgin and Trillian also communicated using the protocol. MSNP was first used in a publicly available product with the first release of MSN Messenger in 1999.

Technical details

Any major change made to the protocol, such as a new command or syntax changes, results in a version-number incremented by one in the format of MSNP#. During October 2003, Microsoft started blocking access to Messenger service using versions below MSNP8.

On September 11, 2007, Microsoft forced most users of MSN Messenger to upgrade to Windows Live Messenger 8.1 due to security considerations.

Security concerns

A 2007 analysis of the Microsoft Notification Protocol, which was unencrypted in its early iterations, concluded that its design "did not follow several principles of designing secure systems", resulting in a "plethora of security vulnerabilities"; these vulnerabilities were demonstrated by successfully spoofing a user's identity.

Version history

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Required Messenger Upgrade". Archived from the original on 2005-12-13. Retrieved 2005-12-13.
  2. ↑ "Microsoft Security Bulletin MS07-054 - Important". September 11, 2007.
  3. ↑ Zheng, Oliver; Poon, Jason (November 2007), Security Analysis of Microsoft Notification Protocol (PDF)