The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Wednesday...

The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Wednesday affirmed a contempt-of-court finding against encrypted email provider Lavabit for resisting a government subpoena asking for the company’s private encryption keys (http://bit.ly/1j1aPtp). Lavabit initially refused to give over the information because it argued doing so would make sensitive customer information vulnerable. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed an amicus brief on Lavabit’s behalf in its appeal (CD Oct 28 p12). Wednesday’s ruling said many of Lavabit’s arguments raised on appeal were new arguments and “when a party in a civil case fails to raise an argument in the lower court and instead raises it for the first time before us, we may reverse only if the newly raised argument establishes ‘fundamental error’ or a denial of fundamental justice.” The only argument against turning over the encryption keys previously was one sentence from Lavabit owner Ladar Levison: “I have only ever objected to turning over the [Secure Sockets Layer] keys because that would compromise all of the secure communications in and out of my network, including my own administrative traffic.” The court ruled “we cannot refashion this vague statement of personal preference into anything remotely close to the argument that Lavabit now raises on appeal."