Issuing a notably forceful defense of its privacy policies, Skype - the voice over IP telephony service which was acquired by Microsoft in May 2011 – rebuffed the media reports in which it was alleged that the service has made some changes to its architecture so as to allow law-enforcement agencies to monitor calls.

In a recent blog post, Skype comprehensively denied the media reports which said that Microsoft had modified the code which drives the popular voice and video service, and had introduced changes in its policies, to help law enforcement eavesdrop on the calls made by the users.

Without identifying the media outlets which charged that the Skype service had been “backdoored,” Mark Gillett - chief development and operations officer at Skype – clarified in a recent blog post that the changes to the Skype architecture had not been made at Microsoft’s behest, as assumed, to give law enforcement agencies an increased access to user communications.

Noting that the deployment of “supernodes” – the powerful computers which function as a distributed directory of Skype users, to help two users locate each other – had begun much before the service’s takeover by Microsoft, Gillett revealed that that the supernodes do not play any role in making calls.

Further adding that Skype had made the changes largely to “improve user experience and reliability,” Gillett said that media reports which suggest that Skype “may be acting improperly or based on ulterior motives against our users' interests” were “contrary to the Skype philosophy.”