One of the more unsettling chilling effects of the US government’s quest to monitor everything internet users are saying online is that it puts a bullseye on the privacy services trying to protect users from exactly that.
Two of the country’s top secure email providers, Lavabit and Silent Circle, shuttered their doors shortly after Edward Snowden blew the lid off the NSA’s domestic surveillance program. Now encryption services continue to drop like flies.
The latest is CryptoSeal Privacy, a VPN service that provides a secure and private way to use the internet. The company announced it’s shutting down its consumer privacy product in order to avoid government attempts to access and monitor users’ encrypted communications.
CryptoSeal explained it must comply with subpoenas and warrants from law enforcement, and basically never anticipated this kind of intrusion from the top ranks of the US intelligence arm when the service first launched. Forced to choose between breaking the law or violating its users’ privacy, the company threw in the towel.
“Essentially, the service was created and operated under a certain understanding of current US law, and that understanding may not currently be valid,” CrytoSeal said in an announcement yesterday. “As we are a US company and comply fully with US law, but wish to protect the privacy of our users, it is impossible for us to continue offering the CryptoSeal Privacy consumer VPN product.”
Yet Another Privacy Service Has Shut Down to Avoid the Feds
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