Data acquiring apparatus

A data acquiring apparatus is disclosed. A comm control portion (1), coupled to a network (N), controls comm with the network; a mail box portion (2) stores at least a block of data (13) from N. An enciphering portion (5) enciphers the block of data from the mail box. A mail box control portion (3) displays a portion of the block of data from the mail box portion on the display in response to a 1st request (8d) via an input portion, controls the mail box, supplies the block of data to the enciphering portion in response to a 2nd request (8e) from the input portion, and operates the enciphering portion to encipher the block of data from the mail block. A filing unit (4) stores the block of data from the enciphering portion. A decoding portion (7) decodes and displays the block of data from the filing unit on the display portion in response to a 3rd request (8f) from the input portion to provide the decoded block of data to a user. The supplied block of data is subjected to an enciphering processing different every user, so that another person cannot utilize the enciphered data, though the storing medium (4a) in the filing unit is removable. On utilizing or erasing data, the notice is transmitted to a data supplier. The distributed data includes the open data portion 11, so that the users can readily know the content of the data.