4040-840 Security and Trust

all, section 7.1.

7.1. History

Philip Zimmermann create PGP 1991.
How to contact him
Where does the name come from: Garrison Keillor's fictional town, Lake Wobegon "Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery".
P.Z. intention: PGP encryption was intended so that like-minded people could securely use BBS (meaning anti nuclear)
What was the issue:

--: PGP encryption found its way outside the US
--: February 1993 Zimmermann became the formal target of a criminal investigation by the US Government for "munitions export without a license".
--: Cryptosystems using keys larger than 40 bits were then considered munitions within the definition of the US export regulations
--: PGP has never used keys smaller than 128 bits so it qualified at that time.
--: The document