The top heads in the world of digital cryptography have been working on something for quite a while. Igniting the curiosity of many, they have finally come out with the fruit of their long work – a military-grade encryption service that, the group claims, is absolutely impregnable and secure, even from the governments.
This group, known as Silent Circle, is deemed as a super-group in the world of cryptography. The group comprises of the most accomplished cryptography experts in the world, including Phil Zimmerman who is the creator of PGP, John Calla who is the inventor of Apple’s Whole Disk Encryption, and professionals who have worked on military-grade communications encryption in the past.
Encryption over smartphones or mobile devices is not new. Many solutions are currently available to accomplish this. But all of these solutions are somewhat difficult to work with and often result in deeming the warranty of the device void. The solution that the Silent Circle has come forth with is different.
It is simply an app which, once you install on your smartphone, will provide end-to-end encryption. PGP encryption will be used to secure text messages, voice calls, pictures, videos and virtually all data transfer that may happen between two smartphones. The best part about this app is that it is extremely easy to use and is so secure that even the governments won’t be able to decrypt the data encrypted by it.
To make things more obvious, a key is used to encrypt data at the sender’s end and another is used to decrypt it at the receiver end. Once the data transaction is complete, keys are deleted from both devices and new keys are generated. Some may cite that the company may still have the data which can then be decrypted if need be. But Silent Circle ensures that the data will not be stored by the company, any of it. And that kind of makes their case convincing.
For now, Silent Circle has plans of providing the excellent solution for some $20 per month to annual subscribers. Those subscribing for three months may get it at a little higher price tag of nearly $30 per month. We are still to hear the feedback of other security experts about this solution. And if it turns out to be as easy, convenient and invulnerable as Silent Circle claims, the subscription fee wouldn’t seem too much for most security-conscious users.
Source: Silent Circle
Courtesy: Slate
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