Security News > 2021 > June > Cryptography whizz Phil Zimmermann looks back at 30 years of Pretty Good Privacy

Encryption and verification package Pretty Good Privacy has celebrated a troubled 30 years of securing secrets and giving cypherpunks an excuse to meet in person, with original developer and security specialist Phil Zimmermann toasting a world where encryption is common but, he warns, still under threat.

Following the end of the criminal investigation into Zimmermann, the PGP team set up PGP Inc. which was quickly gobbled up by security specialist Network Associates Inc. in 1997.

The feature set of PGP grew quickly, but Zimmermann grew disillusioned and parted ways with the company in 2001 before Network Associates put its PGP assets up for sale.

While there were definite fears that PGP would die a death in limbo, those assets became PGP Corporation in 2002, with Zimmermann taking the role of social advisor and consultant.

Despite concerns about its usability and a handful of security concerns - though never truly broken - the core technology introduced in PGP 1.0 remains very much alive among everyone from privacy enthusiasts and cypherpunks to CESG, the cybersecurity division of UK spy agency GCHQ - when it works, at least.

PGP itself is now most commonly used in tools adhering to the OpenPGP specification, an email-focused standard under the stewardship of the OpenPGP Alliance, founded by Zimmermann himself back in 2001.

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https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2021/06/08/pgp_at_30/