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In our increasingly wired world, we expose some of the most intimate details of our private lives on the Internet--often without knowing it. One way this happens is through e-mail. The very nature of e-mail is such that your "private" communications really aren't. They can be intercepted, for instance, by hackers during transit or as they sit on servers waiting to be picked up.

Since we all have secrets we'd rather not expose, several solutions have been developed to help you secure your e-mail. One of our favorites is PGP Freeware. (The acronym stands for Pretty Good Privacy.) It lets you scramble your messages so that only your intended recipient can read them. PGP has been around in various forms for nine years, so it's reliable and battle tested. Its source code is available, so if you're the paranoid type, you can look directly at what makes PGP tick and convince yourself that the government isn't listening in as you use it. And best of all, PGP is free.

In this article, we'll show you how to grab your own copy of PGP, set it up, and use it to communicate privately and securely with friends, business associates, and anyone else on the Net.

Who says privacy is dead? It's only a software installation away.