[Cryptography] GCHQ [request for crypto keys] Forced Secure Email Service PrivateSky to Shut Down

[Tony Naggs]

From
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/529392/20131211/gchq-forced-privatesky-secure-email-service-offline.htm

Security firm CertiVox forced to pull its PrivateSky secure email product
after GCHQ forced its hand over users' data.

PrivateSky was shut down at the beginning of the year after introducing a
web-based version in beta and for Outlook and had "tens of thousands of
heavily active users".

B rian Spector, CEO of CertiVox, told IT Security Guru: "Towards the end of
2012, we heard from the National Technical Assistance Centre (NTAC), a
division of GCHQ and a liaison with the Home Office, [that] they wanted the
keys to decrypt the customer data. We did it before Lavabit and Silent
Circle and it was before Snowden happened.

"It is the same in the USA with FISMA, and it is essentially a national
security warrant. So in late 2012 we had the choice to make - either
architect the world's most secure encryption system on the planet, so
secure that CertiVox cannot see your data, or spend £500,000 building a
backdoor into the system to mainline data to GCHQ so they can mainline it
over to the NSA.

"It would be anti-ethical to the values and message we are selling our
customers in the first place."

[Article continues ...]
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