BT pull out of Phorm

[Peter Ryan]

maybe BT's chief security architect, Bruce Schneier, could enlighten us?!

peter


________________________________________
From: ukcrypto-bounces at chiark.greenend.org.uk [ukcrypto-bounces at chiark.greenend.org.uk] On Behalf Of Theo Markettos [theom+news at chiark.greenend.org.uk]
Sent: 07 July 2009 13:44
To: UK Cryptography Policy Discussion Group
Subject: Re: BT pull out of Phorm

In article <03d801c9fe49$c0b20650$421612f0$@net> you wrote:
> "[Our decision has] nothing to do with cost or privacy, it's about resources
> and priority," he added.
>
> Resources in this case could involve rack space and power/cooling
> requirements in the colocations. For BT it could simply be hard tangible
> economics (rather than the intangible tangle of privacy and the unfathomable
> British intercept laws).

Could be.  OTOH those could be PR reasons - they don't want to upset Phorm
too much by trashing their reputation (see how much the Phorm share price
has already tanked since the announcement).  BT evidently wanted to pull
out, but perhaps there was an agreement to pull out 'amicably' rather than
BT saying exactly what they think of Phorm?

Impossible to say... though BT went noticeably lukewarm over the idea in recent months.

Theo