Pidgin on Win 7 - Is it safe?

Hi everyone. Just a really quick question here regarding IM clients. They strike me as being a very vulnerable, yet inescapable, part of computing these days. I used to rely on Trillian, but the unfortunate reality is that Trillian has become less secure and doesn't play well on Windows 7 at all.

I'm thinking about using Pidgin, but I'm wondering if anyone has any experience with this program? It seems to work as expected for YIM connections, but when using it for AIM, TCPIPview shows that it opens upwards of a dozen connections. Even Trillian only used two or so, so I'm highly suspicious of why Pidgin would need to have that many simultaneous open connections.

 

ive tried it in the past and not all accounts would connect properly,

i use digsby.

 

Dude, it's open-source. Feel free to download and inspect the source code, then compile it yourself if you're that paranoid.

 

Indeed. I've used it off and on over the past couple of years and have never had an issue with performance or security. I certainly prefer it over Yahoos' official messaging application.

 

I had heard that digsby installed some shady software when you use it?

Forgive me for not having the knowledge or the experience to do this. I'm merely concerned that it's opening so many connections.

 

nah, it gives you the options to during installation, just choose not to like i do.

 

Pidgin is fine. It is the default IM client in Ubuntu (or used to be). There is nothing malicious about it and it has the added perk of being able to use the OTR plugin.

 

I appreciate all of the input! I realize that Pidgin is considered safe, but I'm curious why I needs so many ports open.

Here's an example of what it does with YIM: Not too many ports/connections open.

http://i50.tinypic.com/2hz4xhe.jpg

Now here's what happens when Pidgin connects to AIM. There's no way it needs to do this much. Trillian certainly doesn't need to!

http://i47.tinypic.com/k30saq.jpg

 

I don't know, I only use Windows Live Messenger.

But I noticed on your screenshots that Pidgin opens 2 UDP ports for each TCP port opened. Maybe video/audio/file transfer protocol support?

 

pidgin is great software it by default given in many enterprise linux why would it given if its buggy
secondly you can check pidgin on virustotal.com and virusscan.jotti.org it not even trigger single alarm

now why it connect to different port by default it made easy of use so many clients use different port for video conferencing file sharing .....etc

the rules are default means it create all the necessary rules for specific chat client so if you dont use filesharing video close those rules of your client side

rules are default rules made because of ease of use

form trillion if you know the rules you can add the same rules for pidgin in your firewall it will also work

and one more thing you can do is make your default pidgin run under sandbox environment its will make more safe for chat clients i run my pidgin under kis sandbox

you can use sandboxie as well for it its a same thing

 

Pidgin is fine and so is Digsby. I'm using Digsby on Windows 7, UE, 64-bit and I kind of like it since Facebook, Twitter and Myspace are integrated into it. Just say no to all optional installations and you are fine.