In an aim to make their PGP desktop security suite software friendlier and easier to use, the PGP Corporation has launched a complete overhaul to the software's design. The corporation hopes that the new software will help users to perform encryption exercises that were previously seen as too complex or difficult. PGP Whole Disk, for example, can easily encrypt entire laptop, including USB drives and backups with little effort from the user (or so is claimed!)

The consumer and home office edition of the release - PGP Desktop Home 9.0 - ships without PGP Whole Disk encryption and costs $69 for a perpetual licence up until December. PGP Desktop Professional 9.0 - pitched at the corporate market for ad-hoc desktop deployments - costs from $199 per device and comes with PGP Whole Disk encryption. Mind you that's a mixed blessing because users have to be running Windows XP to take advantage of the feature. Mac OS X users need not apply.