PrivyPad 2.52

• Quick specs
• Price: Free to try (Nag screen); $24.95 to buy
• Operating system: Windows 95, Windows Me, Windows NT, Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows 98
• Date added: January 30, 2009
• Total Downloads: 3,899
• Downloads last week: 3
• See full specifications

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CNET editors' review

Reviewed by: CNET staff on September 14, 2009

PrivyPad provides a method to encrypt messages. However, the program's complicated method of reading messages practically ruins an otherwise successful tool.

The program's interface looked instantly familiar, since it mimicks Notepad. While familiar, we still needed to find definitions for our encryption options in the Help file. We created a message just like a normal Notepad document, but were also able to quickly encrypt by simply adding a password with the toolbar icon. At this point we were confused because our message looked the same. It wasn't until we saved the program to our hard drive as a .txt file (or mailed it using the built-in e-mail program) and reopened the document in a separate .txt reader that it appeared as an impossible jumble of letters and numbers. We were a little turned off to learn we needed to cut the jumbled words from the document and paste them back into PrivyPad in order to be prompted for our password and to decrypt the message. Fortunately, the message reappeared perfectly, but the cutting and pasting got old very fast. Also frustrating was how the program's description boasted four separate encryption algorithms, however, this feature practically required a computer science degree to understand, so we couldn't determine the benefits of any of these features.

PrivyPad's trial contains a nag screen upon opening and closing. The program comes as a compressed file. While it successfully encrypted our words, there is too much added effort involved and we do not recommend this program.

Publisher's description

Create, edit, read and e-mail encrypted or plain text files with this Notepad-like text editor. Features: 4 encryption/decryption algorithms: BLOWFISH, XOR, Triple DES (3DES) and RIJNDAEL (AES), a powerful encryption engine that allows to perform up to 100 encrypting/decrypting steps on highly sensitive information. This ensures a very high level of protection and security and makes PrivyPad the best utility to keep passwords, electronic keys, credit cards, and store other private, secret, secure, strictly confidential data, info and documents, support for creating, editing, sending, and receiving of encrypted e-mails as messages or attachments through the default email client such as MS Outlook Express, Eudora, etc., and through popular Internet e-mail services such as Yahoo! Mail, Hotmail, AOL Mail, etc.

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