

Symantec buys PGP for $300m and GuardianEdge for $70m - jasondavies
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/04/29/symantec_buys_pgp/

======
tptacek
Symantec is where products go to get put out to farm; it's just a few steps
removed from Computer Associates. I use and recommend PGP WDE for the Mac, and
I'm not happy about this announcement.

~~~
there
i'm not sure how anyone can recommend PGP WDE for the mac with pgp's horrible
customer service and long delays getting support out for snow leopard.

~~~
tptacek
Because it works better than the alternatives.

------
wmf
Maybe this explains why PGP CTO Jon Callas got a new job last week.
[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/04/22/jon_callas_joins_app...](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/04/22/jon_callas_joins_apple/)

------
CWuestefeld
_The proposed deals allow Symantec to offer full-disk, email and mobile
encryption products alongside its traditional line of security suites. ...
Symantec plans to standardise on the PGP key management platform in order to
deliver centralised policy and key management_

I'd really love to see a user-friendly way of offering email encryption. The
rising tide of privacy encroachment worries me, and the technology to (mostly)
evade this exists -- but can't be effective unless a critical mass of people
use it.

~~~
JoachimSchipper
I wouldn't be too confident that a government that cracks down on privacy
won't crack down on encryption, if it ever becomes widely used.

~~~
CWuestefeld
The current legal basis for monitoring email in the USA is not that the gov't
has a legitimate interest in seeing it, but that it's old data left sitting
around, so the owner doesn't have a rational expectation of privacy.

If those old messages were still left around, but the bodies were unreadable,
the government wouldn't have any basis to demand that they be decrypted, since
they've not asserted any authority to it (short of a warrant). To do so would
be one heck of a long jump.

------
iuguy
I hate PGP. You can't upgrade. Every time you upgrade you pray you'll be able
to boot and inevitably stuff breaks. Symantec buying this is the only possible
way it could get even worse.

------
raquo
This week is just some mad acquisition party.

