back to article Symantec buys PGP and GuardianEdge too

Symantec has announced a surprise deal to buy both email and data encryption firms PGP Corporation and GuardianEdge Technologies for a combined total of $370m in cash. The security giant is paying $300m for PGP and $70m for GuardianEdge as part of deals announced on Thursday and expected to close in June. Both agreements are …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Deep joy

    Thats PGP ruined then...

    1. Petey
      FAIL

      Oh goddamn...

      ... I completely agree.

      I use PGP all the time and it has a nice light footprint. Tick tock now until the bloatware arrives via Symantec.

    2. Jason DePriest
      Unhappy

      ruined?

      It was ruined when McAfee bought it way back in the day.

      Never has recovered. Even when PGP Corporation went out and bought it back from McAfee.

  2. Daniel 1

    Damn...

    Gone are the days, then, where full-disc encryption operated silently and unobtrusively, in the background.

    Now it is to be a Symantec product, it will kick in, every thirty minutes, generating random spikes of disc-activity and unnecessary network traffic; gradually consuming 90% of all system resources. Within a few years, the only machines capable of actually running full-disc encryption, will be the same Crays, that you'd need to force crack the system, anyway.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Coat

      whole disk encryption

      'Daniel 1' wrote: "Gone are the days, then, where full-disc encryption operated silently and unobtrusively, in the background."

      Umm, you mean the way that TrueCrypt does on my Linux boxes and Pointsec does on Windows?

      That out of the way, all I can say is:

      PGP + Symantec = Fail. In fact, Symantec + anything = fail in my book. Thank the maker for OpenPGP.

  3. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Flame

    I said it before and will say it again

    >>As the IT security industry begins to recover from the credit crunch

    Not a "credit crunch" at all. The standard Keynesian Bubble Bust applies.

    >> patterns from the dot-com bust and previous economic slowdowns are repeated

    I hope not as that would mean an even bigger bust in 3-6 years time.

  4. Velv
    FAIL

    Hope they improve it

    Having recently been forced to use PGP by an ITSecurity department from the dark ages all I can say is good luck to them and I hope they improve it.

    PGP was the slowest, least reliable and most expensive encryption product of the four we tested prior to being forced to uses PGP as they were "a trusted name". We were going to use TrueCrypt but were told we couldn't because it was "open source".

    The PGP consultant they then supplied was useless - they tried to charge us to install it, so that it was "installed properly".

    I know some people don't like Symantec, but I'm surprised PGP are still in business.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Grenade

    (sigh)...

    "Symantec buys PGP"

    A little part of me just died inside.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Yawn...

    Symantec is already OEM'ing the Guardian Edge product. And encryption has been a hole in Symantec's portfolio for years. Make a snarky comment if you did not see either of these coming.

  7. Daniel B.
    Boffin

    Start the Darth Vader scream

    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

    Network Associates nearly killed it, Symantec might well kill it for sure.

    I really hope they'll honor my "lifetime license", as I really don't need all those upgrades they're offering. And something tells me that I won't need them at all, as they will be bloatware.

    Crap.

  8. sisk

    Time to switch from PGP to GPG

    Let Symantec ruin PGP. We have an open source clone we can turn to. I don't know the pros and cons of GPG, but it's got to be better than anything Symantec is going to release.

    1. cmaurand
      Linux

      I've been using GPG for years

      I've never been interested in paying PGP's prices when GPG works just as well and PGP seems to be able to use GPG generated keys. Symantec might break that, though.

  9. Darren Powles
    Flame

    guardian edge, no angel

    First thing that came to my mind was thank goodness guardian edge bites the dust - PGP far superior

    We had some DREADFUL experiences with Guardian Edge - poor reliability and support.

    Pitty Symantec have wasted 70m on that.

  10. Greg Bromage
    FAIL

    I don't believe it...

    I just don't beleive this is happening.

    I mean, I got the email about it from PGP like everyone else.

    But, the email... from PGP President... wasn't digitally signed. So I'm assuming it's a hoax, right?

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re: McAfee share rose...

    You mean on Monday before they hosed a couple million PCs and their prices dropped like a stone? Isn't that worth at least a quick check of the current chart before writing into an article. I've been told thousands of times that Google is your friend for a quick check of facts like that.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    To everyone who says PGP will be ruined...

    You're right. I've never used it myself personally. See you on GPG soon.

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