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GPG Programmer Werner Koch Is Running Out of Money

Posted by timothy on from the open-secret dept.

New submitter jasonridesabike writes "ProPublica reports that Werner Koch, the man behind GPG, is in financial straits: "The man who built the free email encryption software used by whistleblower Edward Snowden, as well as hundreds of thousands of journalists, dissidents and security-minded people around the world, is running out of money to keep his project alive. Werner Koch wrote the software, known as Gnu Privacy Guard, in 1997, and since then has been almost single-handedly keeping it alive with patches and updates from his home in Erkrath, Germany. Now 53, he is running out of money and patience with being underfunded." (You can donate to the project here..)

7 of 222 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Wrong Koch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    That guy sucks. I will give him money when he gives me that back door I've been asking for.

  2. Re:Latest update by CronoCloud · · Score: 4, Funny

    -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
    Hash: SHA1

    Well that's good to hear.
    -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
    Version: GnuPG v1

    iEYEARECAAYFAlTUChMACgkQnludVzJNqF2p2ACdFew+WZRFx3tgIWLSizrfZuc/
    k1EAoK35K6UURyN3CXW5eUEP4bVas9BP
    =UQA4
    -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

  3. dear werner, please finish the damn thing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Michelangelo finished the pieta in 2 years. You've had 18!! Look, it's good stuff, and you could probably milk this till retirement. Even Michelangelo realized finally that if he took one more swing at his sculpture, he'd have detracted from it.
    You keep this up, you're gonna turn out just like that Torvalds kid.

  4. Re:Wrong Koch by epine · · Score: 5, Funny

    Dude, you're posting on Slasbergers with people who read The Fountainhead as teenagers and it totally blew their minds, and been assburgers types they can't grow out of the mindset.

    Funny, in my experience it's the people who aren't blessed with Asperger's syndrome who are particularly prone to pontificate on the basis of choir-pleasing ass-pluck.

    Perhaps we should really rename it obsessive factual reality disorder.

    Furthermore, a great many people who read The Fountainhead at a young age and found it mind blowing went into politics. How I wish more of these people had enough Asperchlorians in their bloodstream to balance their own chequebooks.

  5. Re:Wrong Koch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    No, sorry. I promise it's true though. I read it on a Slashdot comment.

  6. Re:Wrong Koch by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 5, Funny

    Asperchlorians

    My new favorite fake word.

    Not to unseat my favorite real word: quintessential.

    --
    If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
  7. Re:Wrong Koch by crispytwo · · Score: 1, Funny

    Asperchlorians

    take note: coined today!

    #loveit