For more than a decade, the United States government classified encryption technology as a weapon. Now that label might actually apply. Security-consulting firm Foundstone said Thursday that e-mail messages encrypted with the Pretty Good Privacy program can be used as digital bullets to attack and take control of a victim's computer.. . .

For more than a decade, the United States government classified encryption technology as a weapon. Now that label might actually apply. Security-consulting firm Foundstone said Thursday that e-mail messages encrypted with the Pretty Good Privacy program can be used as digital bullets to attack and take control of a victim's computer.

Because of a flaw in the way PGP handles long file names in an encrypted archive, an attacker could "take control of the recipient's computer, elevating his or her privileges on the organization's network," Foundstone said in an advisory.

The link for this article located at ZDNet is no longer available.