Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
of these places, a message could be read by an employee of the ISP, and it could be intercep-
ted in transit by a hacker—or a government agency—during its journey from sender to recip-
ient.
(“Doesn't SSL encrypt my messages?” you may ask. SSL secures a message only between Mail
and your incoming or outgoing mail server, but doesn't prevent someone from reading that
message while it's on a mail server, or during other legs of the delivery process.)
Because so many millions of email messages are exchanged every day, the probability that
any particular message you send or receive will be read by someone who shouldn't see it is
incredibly small—but not zero. So, consider what would happen in one of these situations if
the wrong person read email you sent:
• You need to email your accountant detailed information about your income, ex-
penses, and taxes.
• You need to provide someone with your credit card number, social security num-
ber, or other sensitive information by email.
• You're an executive at a major computer company and you want to discuss top-
secret plans for a new product with your advertising agency—but not risk leaking
the information to the press.
• You need to discuss a sensitive medical condition with your doctor by email, but
you worry that you could lose your job if your employer finds out about it.
• You're a journalist traveling in a politically sensitive region, and you need to file
a story that the local government might find objectionable.
• You're in a country with significant human rights abuses, and you want to tell
your story to the outside world without the authorities finding out.
Get the idea? A lot could be at stake: money, a job, or even a life. In all these cases and count-
less others, you might need a guarantee—not just a presumption—of privacy, and encrypting
email is the only way both parties can be reasonably certain that no one else will read their
messages.
Tip:
To learn much more about online privacy, including not only email but also Web
browsing, file sharing, social networking and other areas, read my topic
Take Control
Of course, in addition to legitimate uses, encrypted email could be used to plan crimes, con-
ceal information from law enforcement agencies, and so on. But the point I want to get across
