PPAP

Origin of the name

Akira Otaishi, who coined the name, was at the time with the Japan Institute for Promotion of Digital Economy and Community (JIPDEC). Taking a hint from the observation that Pikotaro's "PPAP (Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen)" "sounds like a protocol", he named it as a way of raising the problem of security measures that exist only in form. Otaishi later became the representative of PPAP Soken.

Problems

• The password is sent through the same channel — because the file and the password both travel by email, anyone who intercepts the communication learns the password as well
• It slips past antivirus checks — because the contents of an encrypted ZIP file cannot be inspected, gateway and sandbox antivirus systems have difficulty detecting threats, and the method is easily abused to distribute malware
• The encryption is not strong enough — ZIP passwords are easily broken by brute force
• It is inconvenient — the recipient has to go to the trouble of extracting the file, which is especially awkward on a smartphone

Moves to abolish it

In November 2020, Takuya Hirai, Minister for Digital Transformation, announced that PPAP would be abolished in the central government ministries, and the change took effect at the Cabinet Office and the Cabinet Secretariat from the 26th of that month. In the private sector, Hitachi announced in October 2021 that it would abolish the practice across the whole group from December of that year, and other companies followed. Online storage, file transfer services, business chat and email encryption are cited as alternatives.