FC: PGP author Phil Zimmermann under fire for terrorist crypto use?

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

Background on Phil Zimmermann:
http://www.politechbot.com/cgi-bin/politech.cgi?name=zimmermann
http://www.mccullagh.org/image/6/phil-zimmermann.html

---

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1234-2001Sep20.html

   By Ariana Eunjung Cha
   Washington Post Staff Writer
   Friday, September 21, 2001; Page E01

   The tears have come in the kitchen, the car and the shower, too.

   Like many Americans, Phil Zimmermann, a stocky, 47-year-old computer
   programmer, has been crying every day since last week's terrorist
   attacks. He has been overwhelmed with feelings of guilt.

   Zimmermann is the inventor of a computer program called Pretty Good
   Privacy, or PGP. He posted the tool for free on the Internet 10 years
   ago; it was the first to allow ordinary people to encrypt messages so
   only those with a "key" could read them. No government or law
   enforcement agency has been able to get in.

   People warned Zimmermann back then that he could be putting powerful
   technology into the wrong hands. He knew that was theoretically
   possible, but he also knew that the program could do good: His work
   created a way for people in oppressed countries to communicate without
   fear of retribution.

   Now the government is investigating whether Zimmermann's technology or
   another scrambler was used by the hijackers to coordinate last week's
   attacks, and U.S. lawmakers are calling for new restrictions on the
   use and distribution of the technology.

   [...]




-------------------------------------------------------------------------
POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list
You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice.
Declan McCullagh's photographs are at http://www.mccullagh.org/
To subscribe to Politech: http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html
This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------