Well, it actually is true that the asymmetric encryption feature of the premium Lavabit service is designed to make intercepts impossible. Only the account holder can decrypt it.
Handing over account payment information in response to lawful requests is quite a different matter from defeating asymmetric encryption. Account info is unencrypted records that Lavabit has access to in accordance with their TOS. They can turn those over, in accordance to their TOS.
Faking out their own service to defeat their own encryption, which they specifically advertised as being only decryptable by the account holder and not Lavabit, is a whole different ballgame.
I noted exactly what you stated, that Lavabit offered to help the government implement something like that -- only after being threatened with the "nuclear option" of key seizure.
You've got to concede that there's room for some doubt as to whether Lavabit could be trusted to comply with something as extraordinary as that. It would be trusting them to reneg on a specific promise made to all customers about the security of their service, namely that it is impossible for Lavabit to snoop on encrypted communications.
Handing over account payment information in response to lawful requests is quite a different matter from defeating asymmetric encryption. Account info is unencrypted records that Lavabit has access to in accordance with their TOS. They can turn those over, in accordance to their TOS.
Faking out their own service to defeat their own encryption, which they specifically advertised as being only decryptable by the account holder and not Lavabit, is a whole different ballgame.
I noted exactly what you stated, that Lavabit offered to help the government implement something like that -- only after being threatened with the "nuclear option" of key seizure.
You've got to concede that there's room for some doubt as to whether Lavabit could be trusted to comply with something as extraordinary as that. It would be trusting them to reneg on a specific promise made to all customers about the security of their service, namely that it is impossible for Lavabit to snoop on encrypted communications.