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Thanks for checking out the Nik Hawks Show, where my general mandate is to follow the pursuit of excellence. 

My background is in business, adventure, the military, athletic challenges, and working with world class athletes.

Those are all starting points for my guests, though not always.  I've talked to cryptographers, sleep scientists, authors, reporters, climbers, and adventurers.

All of them have useful insight for YOU, which is the reason I make the show public.  

Whether we're talking about cryptocurrency or rowing a boat across the Atlantic, my idea was to share the conversations I was having with radical people.  Lately I've been adding in my own thoughts in separate Nik-i-sodes.

HISTORY

I started this podcast in 2014, but it wasn't called The Nik Hawks Show. My wife Lee and I own the company Paleo Treats, so I called the show the Paleo Treats Podcast.

Over the course of 50+ episodes it became apparent that the podcast didn’t really have anything to do with Paleo. Sometime around episode 58, based on feedback from listeners and iTunes reviews, I decided to change the name to reflect what I was actually talking about.

That should catch you up to speed for now.  

To read more, find the latest episodes and news along with a way to support this show, please visit my site nikhawks.com

Thanks for listening!

Nik Hawks

Apr 14, 2014

Phil Zimmerman is one of the world's experts on cryptography, which is the study and application of ensuring that no one but you and the person you're talking to can understand what you're saying.

In 1991 Phil invented the way that we secure email communications (PGP, or Pretty Good Privacy) and has been awarded damn near everything you can be noticed for in the digital encryption world, including being inducted into the Internet Hall of Fame, named top 50 tech visionaries of the last 50 years, top 10 innovator in e-business, one of the 50 most influential people on the internet; the list goes on.

In this episode Phil talks about how he got into encryption (he was a peace activist), the weaknesses of email, and the current state of both cryptography and cryptanalytics, including commenting on the Snowden revelations.

He also talks about why we (I'm assuming you're like me and a pretty regular person) need encryption as normal citizens. I don't have anything to hide, do you? You might re-think the way you conduct communications after this.

Enjoy!