State v. Levie
The main purpose of encryption is to change any data to a humanly unreadable form. Nowadays, encryption is seen as one of the key solutions to prevent the unauthorized disclosure of information. 
Companies and governmental entities have been spending time and money implementing ways to fight cybercrime and increase awareness between internet users and general public with the purpose to reduce the occurrence of crimes such as Identity theft. 
Mainly, one can say that encryption is about privacy. The right to a "safety zone" and privacy exists in the First and Fourth Amendment rights in the USA where a remarkable and recent privacy-based law has been approved, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. In Europe the Lisbon Treaty describes the protection of fundamental data as fundamental human right. 
While achieving privacy through the use of encryption seems to provide everyone with answers to decrease the disclosure of personal information, it benefits the possibility to conceal from authorities acts of terrorism, child pornography and others.
The use of encryption tools is becoming more and more disseminated; states are starting to make a crime "to use encryption". States like Illinois in USA are creating specific laws to handle this matter : "A person shall not knowingly use or attempt to use encryption, directly or indirectly, to:
Human rights and encryption
Encryption supports this mode of communication by allowing people to protect the integrity, availability and confidentiality of their communications. The requirement of uninhibited communications is an important precondition for freedom of communication, which is acknowledged by constitutional courts e.g. US Supreme Court and the German Bundesverfassungsgericht as well as the European Court of Human Rights. More specifically, meaningful communication requires people's ability to freely choose the pieces of information and develop their ideas, the style of language and select the medium of communication according to their personal needs. Uninhibited communication is also a precondition for autonomous personal development. Human beings grow their personality by communicating with others. UN's first Special Rapporteur on Privacy, professor Joe Cannataci, stated that ""privacy is not just an enabling right as opposed to being an end in itself, but also an essential right which enables the achievement of an over-arching fundamental right to the free, unhindered development of one's personality"". In case such communication is inhibited, the interaction is biased because a statement does not only reflect the speaker's true (innermost) personal views but can be unduly influenced by considerations that should not shape communication in the first place. Therefore, the process of forming one's personality through social interaction is disrupted. In a complex society freedom of speech does not become reality when people have the right to speak. A second level of guarantees need to protect the precondition of making use of the right to express oneself. If there is the risk of surveillance the right to protect one freedom of speech by means of encryption has to be considered as one of those second level rights. Thus, restriction of the availability and effectiveness of encryption as such constitutes an interference with the freedom of expression and the right to privacy as it protects private life and correspondence. Therefore, it has to be assessed in terms of legality, necessity and purpose.