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TICKET ARCHIVE -> Encryption

No Wonder User - Mar 1, 1998 - 10:24 pm

Knowledge Level: Intermediate
Problem: No Problem
Computer Type: Apple
Model: 7500/100
RAM: 32meg
RAM Enhancer: None
OS Version: MacOS 8

Description:
How does encryption work? If I wanted to send an Email message encrypted to someone what do I need to do? Do I need some special software? Does it work with all EMail clients? What does the receiver of the message need? How do we exchange keys? Is this all cross platform? Can any computer do it? Is there an article somewhere (encryption for dummies)?
Thanks for any help.

-Richard Bock

Send Attachments?

No Wonder Tech - Mar 2, 1998 - 7:30 am

hehehee, you should visit the PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) page, http://www.pgp.com, and read thru the explanations. Very basically, there are many different ways to encrypt things, on of the easiest to use is public key encryption - you create a public key, and register it, or attache it to email messages etc, then if someone wants to send you a message they use your public key to encrypt it, when you get the message you use your private key to decrypt it. The algorithms are very strong, and no one can break your key from just your public key (for the most part, it does depend on the program and the encryption length). PGP is the defacto standard for public key encryption, you can download a free for personal use copy of PGP for the Mac at the site above. It will also allow you to encrypt files, text documents and about anything else.

Some one recieving an encrypted message via the public key scheme will already have what they need because they needed it in order to create a public key that you use to encrypt a message to them PGP, runs on every platform I can think of (Mac, PC, Unix, AIX, NT- I'm not sure about BE).

Anymore questions, feel free to email me - but do visit http://www.pgp.com - it has a wealth of information