Exhausting as it is to keep track of the latest attempts at totalitarianism, I try.

So earlier I read Declan McCullagh's piece about the latest attempt by the Obama administration to crackdown on encryption:

The Obama administration will seek a new federal law forcing Internet e-mail, instant-messaging, and other communication providers offering encryption to build in backdoors for law enforcement surveillance, The New York Times reported today.

Communication providers, apparently including companies that offer voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services, would be compelled to reconfigure their systems so that police could be guaranteed access to descrambled information.

It could become illegal for a company to offer completely secure encrypted communications--through a protocol such as ZRTP, for instance--if its customers held the keys and the provider did not.

And if the president embraces this, he will be violating a campaign promise:

If President Obama does embrace the FBI's proposal, he runs the risk of alienating civil libertarians who supported him in 2008, when he ran on a platform that said as president, he would "strengthen privacy protections for the digital age."

In response to a CNET Technology Voters' Guide survey, then-candidate Obama said at the time that: "I will work with leading legislators, privacy advocates, and business leaders to strengthen both voluntary and legally required privacy protections."

Philip R. Zimmermann is the creator of Pretty Good Privacy, an email encryption software package. Originally designed as a human rights tool, PGP was published for free on the Internet in 1991. This made Zimmermann the target of a three-year criminal investigation, because the government held that US export restrictions for cryptographic software were violated when PGP spread worldwide. Despite the lack of funding, the lack of any paid staff, the lack of a company to stand behind it, and despite government persecution, PGP nonetheless became the most widely used email encryption software in the world. After the government dropped its case in early 1996, Zimmermann founded PGP Inc.

God bless him. Interestingly, according to Zimmermann, PGP was Biden-inspired software.

Biden's bill -- and the threat of encryption being outlawed -- is what spurred Phil Zimmermann to write PGP, thereby kicking off a historic debate about export controls, national security, and privacy. Zimmermann, who's now busy developing Zfone, says it was Biden's legislation "that led me to publish PGP electronically for free that year, shortly before the measure was defeated after vigorous protest by civil libertarians and industry groups."

Phil Zimmmermann is not only the creator of PGP, but he has a new product called Zfone, which is still in the beta testing phase and looks great. Wired took it for a test drive in 2006, and liked it:

How easy is it for the average internet user to make a phone call secure enough to frustrate the NSA's extrajudicial surveillance program?

Wired News took Phil Zimmermann's newest encryption software, Zfone, for a test drive and found it's actually quite easy, even if the program is still in beta.

Zimmermann, the man who released the PGP e-mail encryption program to the world in 1991 -- only to face an abortive criminal prosecution from the government -- has been trying for 10 years to give the world easy-to-use software to cloak internet phone calls.

On March 14, Zimmermann released a beta version of the widely anticipated Zfone. The software is currently available only for OS X (Tiger) and Linux, though a Windows version is due in April.

The open-source software manages cryptographic handshakes invisibly, and encrypts and decrypts voice calls as the traffic leaves and enters the computer. Operation is simple, and users don't have to agree in advance on an encryption key or type out long passcodes to make it work.

So I thought I would let some friends know about not only the latest Obama administration move, but about Zfone.

Especially after Glenn said this:

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, THE GOVERNMENT WOULD WANT EXPANDED INTERNET SNOOPING POWERS: And They Were Right! "The Obama administration is developing plans that would require all Internet-based communication services -- such as encrypted BlackBerry e-mail, Facebook, and Skype -- to be capable of complying with federal wiretap orders, according to a report published Monday."

I send and receive tons of email each day, and all of a sudden today -- for the very first time -- I have had personal emails to friends being blocked by Verizon, which claims I am sending spam -- but only if I mention the following link:

http://zfone.com/

Or any link such as this one pointing to zfone site.

I have tried multiple times with a friend with whom I regularly correspond. I can send this:

Read and weep:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20017671-281.html

This development is a reaction to Zfone

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/04/70524

Unable to send e-mail: 550 5.7.1 The message you attempted to send was determined to be spam. Please visit http://www.verizon.net/spamfaq for more information.

What does it mean if I get an error message that indicates that I sent spam?
The error message is intended to notify you that a message you attempted to send was blocked because it was determined to be spam. It also provides you with a link to this FAQ page for more information.

What should I do if I receive a spam notification message when I attempt to send email?
Sending spam from the Verizon.net domain is prohibited by the Acceptable Use Policy https://my.verizon.com/central/vzc.portal_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=vzc_help_policies.

If you feel we identified your email in error, you may forward the suspected email message as an attachment to spamdetector.update@verizon.net . The message will be examined by third party anti-spam experts. If the message is found to be legitimate, Verizon is notified to adjust or modify the spam filter which caught your message. You will not receive any notification following the review process.

How does Verizon determine whether my E-mail is SPAM?
Verizon uses a third party vendor to scan email messages for spam. Their systems use a combination of proprietary anti-spam techniques and spam complaints sent from users across the Internet to create spam filters. The false positive rate is very low.

And I don't need a review process, damn it. I just want to be able to communicate my thoughts in an email.

But it gets better. As I was writing this post, I got an email from M. Simon on another subject, so thinking I would use him as a guinea pig, I replied thusly:

It may be a power sharing deal.

But I'm glad you just emailed me, as I wanted to know why my isp is not allowing me to mention any links to zfone in any emails.

I hope you don't mind if I conduct an experiment with you.

Earlier, I tried to email another friend thusly:

***QUOTE***

Read and weep:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20017671-281.html

This development is a reaction to Zfone

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/04/70524

I would suggest downloading it here before they make it illegal:

http://zfone.com/getstarted.html

***END QUOTE***

OK, so let's see if this goes through.

So I edited out the last line so it read thusly:

I would suggest downloading it here before they make it illegal:

http://xxxx.com/getstarted.html

What could possibly be up with Verizon? I have been using them for at least a decade, and sent a gazillion links to a gazillion people over the years, and tonight is the first time that an email from me to anyone has been blocked as "spam." I hate spam and spammers, and I consider this borderline slander.

But I can't help wondering whether Verizon might be doing the bidding of Obama and Biden.

Maybe Phil Zimmermann should sue and get into discovery.

Yeah, it sounds sarcastic and facetious, but our freedom may depend on such things.

MORE: After forwarding one of the blocked emails to Verizon's "spamdetector.update" with a complaint, the situation seems to have been remedied, and I can now mention zfone.com in emails.

Still no explanation, though.

Should I now be grateful?

BOTTOM LINE: The federal government is trying to make encrypted communication illegal. For all the faults of the Bush administration, they never tried this.

This move strikes at the very heart of our freedom, and any such regulation or legislation would violate the First Amendment (by telling us what we cannot say) and the Fourth Amendment (by infringing the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects).