Phil Zimmermann's New App Protects Smartphones From Prying Ears

Hugh Pickens writes "Neal Ungerleider notes that cryptography pioneer and Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) creator Phil Zimmermann has launched a new startup that provides industrial-strength encryption for Android and iOS where users will have access to encrypted phone calls, emails, VoIP videoconferencing, SMS, and MMS. Text and multimedia messages are wiped from a phone's registry after a pre-determined amount of time, and communications within the network are allegedly completely secure. An 'off-shore' company with employees from many countries, Silent Circle's target market includes troops serving abroad, foreign businesspeople in countries known for surveillance of electronic communications, government employees, human rights activists, and foreign activists. For encryption tools, which are frequently used by dissidents living under repressive regimes and others with legitimate reasons to avoid government surveillance, the consequences of failed encryption can be deadly. 'Everyone has a solution [for security] inside your building and inside your network, but the big concern of the large multinational companies coming to us is when the employees are coming home from work, they're on their iPhone, Android, or iPad emailing and texting,' says Zimmermann. 'They're in a hotel in the Middle East. They're not using secure email. They're using Gmail to send PDFs.' Another high-profile encryption tool, Cryptocat, was at the center of controversy earlier this year after charges that Cryptocat had far too many structural flaws for safe use in a repressive environment."

You mean like Burner for iOS?

[SuperKendall]

I doubt it. Our apple overlords will categorise this as 'Undesirable' as it allows their phone users to communicate in ways that they want

It's funny how so many things people seem to doubt Apple would ever approve, actually get approved. Like for instance a virtualized burner phone [apple.com], an app that provides you a temporary number lasting a week or as long as you see fit.

There's already a ton of precedent for Apple to approve something like Silent Circle, and a ton of people like yourself in the dustbin of failed predictions claiming Apple will not accept product X because, well, Apple.

Re:Failsafe encryption requires no MitM

[thestuckmud]

This isn't Zimmerman's first time around the block. His Zrtp protocol for SIP (VOIP) security includes Short Authentications Strings which can be communicated by voice or even out of channel, as well as shared secrets from previous connections. These offer reasonable protection against man in the middle attacks.