Skype explored how to aid law enforcement by snooping under secret ‘Project Chess’

Skype explored how to aid law enforcement by snooping under secret ‘Project Chess’: Under a program called “Project Chess,” Skype looked into some of the legal and technical challenges of making it easier for intelligence agencies to tap into Skype calls, anonymous sources tell The New York Times. The existence of the project was known by fewer than a dozen people.

Sources say that Skype started Project Chess in 2008, back when it was owned by eBay and long before it fell into the arms of its current owner, Microsoft. The move also came years before Skype joined PRISM in January 2011, according to the documents leaked by the now-infamous National Security Agency whistle-blower Edward Snowden.