“Silent Circle” Encrypted Email Service Chooses To Shut Down Too

We have already see the encrypted email service Lavabit voluntarily shut down rather than comply with U.S government requests or try and fight the U.S federal court rulings in what would be a long and expensive legal battle. Now another encrypted email service provider, Silent Circle, has taken an identical move.

Silent Circle offered encrypted email services much like Lavabit. The company has opted to shut down its encrypted email service, before the U.S government had even filed any requests to them. It said it wanted to save its users from having to make an abrupt change thus giving them the time necessary to migrate to a new service before the Silent Mail service is forced offline.

“We see the writing the wall, and we have decided that it is best for us to shut down Silent Mail now. We have not received subpoenas, warrants, security letters, or anything else by any government, and this is why we are acting now”, the company stated.

Silent Circle is continuing to keep all its other secure products – Silent Phone, Silent Text and Silent Eyes, since it can guarantee that the encryption is end-to-end. It claims its email service was inherently flawed which is why it is axing the service. It is not known if the U.S federal government intends, or is able, to file a lawsuit against Silent Circle’s other services.

Image courtesy of Silent Circle