Many people are worried cloud computing will leave them in nominal control of their data. As cloud computing is still in its infancy we can expect these fears to be addressed soon. Scientists at the University of Washington have come up with a tool that will make online messages, including emails and Facebook messages, self-destruct after they attain a pre-specified age. The tool is aptly called Vanish.

The process begins when a message encrypted using Vanish is sent. The message can only be read until a pre-specified time is reached, after which the message can not be decrypted, as the encryption key is permanently “lost due to a set of both natural and programmed processes.”

Vanish works by shattering the encryption key and distributing the various fragments among computers on a peer-to-peer network – both parties holding the online conversation don’t possess the key. The pieces of the key begin to vanish due to the fact that “machines constantly join and leave the P2P network.” A prototype of the tool is now available. It supports timeouts of 8-9 hours, which simply means your messages will vanish without a trace after that time.

Image Credit: Vanish (University of Washington)