I have been following the shutdown of LAVABIT - the Edward Snowden email service. Mr. Levison decided to shutdown the service rather than re-engineer his system to allow the NSA access to encrypted emails. For those that were unfamiliar with the service, paid users' email was stored on the server in such a way that it was only readable with the user's password. Instead of granting the government's request, Mr. Levison decided to kill his baby, and that shows great personal integrity.
The 800 pound gorilla in the room is warrant-less wiretapping, using NSA Letters instead Court Orders, while we have no "proof" that Lavabit got one of these letter's, it is pretty obvious that Mr. Levison is under a gag order, and has hinted that his order came from a secret FISA court.
I truly believe that I as an American have the right to encrypt sensitive information, such as my medical information, which is privileged, and protected by the law. I think tat this new attack on encrypted data, and the wholesale turning over of Cloud based information is a horrible president, and Mr. Levison should be praised for refusing to bend to Government pressure!