An encrypted email service thought to have been used by former US intelligence worker Edward Snowden has been shut down, its founder said Friday.
The owner of the Texas-based Lavabit service, Ladar Levison, said in a letter published on the internet that he took the decision to suspend operations rather than “become complicit in crimes against the American people.” Levison gave few other details, though reports have suggested he has been involved in legal moves to prevent US officials from accessing details of customers.
Snowden — who has been granted temporary asylum in Russia — faces espionage charges in the US, after leaking details of US surveillance programmes to the media.