Lavabit owner Ladar Levison confirmed the news in a public post on the company's website. He said continuing the service would inevitably force him to commit crimes against the American people, due to its links to notorious PRISM whistleblower Edward Snowden, who is a well-known user of its services.
"I have been forced to make a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or walk away from nearly 10 years of hard work by shutting down Lavabit. After significant soul searching, I have decided to suspend operations," read the statement.
Snowden is an ex-CIA analyst who famously leaked details about the NSA's PRISM campaign. The campaign revealed that the agency is siphoning vast amounts of web users' data from big-name tech companies like Google, Microsoft, Twitter and Facebook. Following the leak the US has been doggedly pursuing Snowden, who fled the country moments after.
Levison said he could not share the exact reasons for the decision, but hinted an unnamed number of government agencies had already issued data requests from the company, presumably targeting Snowden.
"I wish that I could legally share with you the events that led to my decision. I cannot. I feel you deserve to know what's going on – the first amendment is supposed to guarantee me the freedom to speak out in situations like this," read the statement.
"Unfortunately, Congress has passed laws that say otherwise. As things currently stand, I cannot share my experiences over the last six weeks, even though I have twice made the appropriate requests."
The Lavabit head said the company has already begun proceedings to fight the gag order in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, calling for businesses to avoid using American hosted messaging services in the interim.
Following the revelation, Silent Circle announced similar plans to discontinue its own secure Silent Mail service. Silent Circle's Jon Callas announced the company's plans in a public post clarifying that the company has not received any data requests from the US government and is only ending the service to ensure its customers' future privacy.
"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," read the statement.
"We've been debating this for weeks, and had changes planned starting next Monday. We'd considered phasing the service out, continuing service for existing customers, and a variety of other things up until today. It is always better to be safe than sorry, and with your safety we decided that the worst decision is always no decision."
Callas said the company's Silent Phone, Silent Text and Silent Eyes services will keep operating as they do not actually store any user data. "Silent Phone and Silent Text, along with their cousin Silent Eyes, are end-to-end secure. We don't have the encrypted data and we don't collect metadata about your conversations. They're continuing as they have been. We are still working on innovative ways to do truly secure communications. Silent Mail was a good idea at the time, and that time is past," read the statement.
The NSA is one of many agencies caught monitoring citizens' web habits. Within the UK the GCHQ has been accused of tapping the fibre optic cables connecting the country to the internet in an operation codenamed Tempora. Prior to Callas' comments, Silent Circle chief executive Mike Janke cited operations such as Tempora as proof European businesses should be more concerned about local spooks than the NSA, during an interview with V3.
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