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I use GPG quite a bit. I sign my git commits with it, occasionally use it to securely transfer files with people, and appreciate to have everything coupled with

I use GPG quite a bit. I sign my git commits with it, occasionally use it to securely transfer files with people, and appreciate to have everything coupled with my Yubikey. What are reasonable alternatives to this right now? If I’m not using the keyservers, it’s not that bad, right?

danShumway 7y ago
This is my reaction as well. This seems bad, but... what should I do? What's the alternative? I've seen multiple people say that PGP in general is kind of bad and it would be easy for the tech industry to write a secure alternative if it really wanted to. Cool, but that's not useful right now to ordinary people like me who aren't crypto experts who are trying to decide how we should sign/encrypt messages. I have no idea what I would use as an alternative to PGP.
- tptacek 7y ago
  To send messages, use a secure messenger, like Signal or Wire. Don't use PGP.
  - faho 7y ago
    Okay, and to sign commits or emails? To encrypt files?
    - tptacek 7y ago
      Don't encrypt and sign emails.
      - danShumway 7y ago
        This is not a realistic solution. SMS-sized messages are the least hard part of this for me. What I want is to be able to point at a file or folder on my computer and say, "sign that with a public key so I can prove I wrote it" or "encrypt that with someone else's public key so only they can read it". At that point, I don't necessary care all that much about how the file gets sent over the network. It doesn't need to be integrated into email, but it does need to be a low-level enough operation that I can use it on an arbitrary block of text, file, or folder of any size. Is there a replacement that does that? I use Signal, and it's great. But Signal is not a replacement for PGP, it's a replacement for one, very specific use-case for PGP.
        jrockway 7y ago
        I haven't used it for this, but I think Keybase might be a good system for filling the role of keyservers. If you just want encrypted messaging, it has it. But you can also store your PGP key in there and people can trust it if they trust Keybase's other proofs (which are not necessarily a leap of faith, you can go to the source and verify them).
        tptacek 7y ago
        You asked (among other things) how to send messages securely without PGP. Don't use PGP to send secure messages; use a secure messenger, like Signal or Wire. Someone else asked how to email securely without PGP. Email isn't secure with PGP. Don't use PGP to send encrypt emails, and don't use email to send secure messages; use a secure messenger, like Signal or Wire. I acknowledge there are use cases not well covered by secure messengers. The current state of file encryption, which is practically the "hello world" of encryption problems, is a travesty. If you're simply looking to sign something, and later verify that it was you who signed it, use minisign. But that's a very narrow use case.
        rocqua 7y ago
        > The current state of file encryption, which is practically the "hello world" of encryption problems, is a travesty. Do you know of any projects that are aiming to solve this? It feels like all that is needed is a halfway decent standard file format, and some tools to bootstrap it. That seems to be how we got TLS and SSH, which are the two successes of encryption. I suppose those two protocols have the advantage of interactive negotiation. Whereas software encrypting a file does not get to negotiate any parameters with the software that will later be decrypting it. Moreover, those protocols had some decent weight behind it. Secure data transport is a problem that matters to essentially everyone these days. Whereas secure and portable file encryption really does not. E-mail is a significant use-case, but only tangentially, and optimal E-mail solutions are not really optimal portable file solutions.
        iancarroll 7y ago
        My money is on `age` right now. https://twitter.com/FiloSottile/status/1128865803938480128 https://twitter.com/FiloSottile/status/1128865803938480128
    - rkeene2 7y ago
      To sign or encrypt emails you could use S/MIME. It is much more widely supported than PGP for signing and encrypting emails as well.
      - tptacek 7y ago
        S/MIME is even worse than PGP. Don't use it.
  - rmrfrmrf 7y ago
    Proprietary messengers are never secure.
    - AnaniasAnanas 7y ago
      Both Signal and Wire are FOSS though.
  - nh2 7y ago
    @tptacek I have seen various endorsements of Signal from you, Bruce Schneier, Edward Snowden and so on. I am honestly curious about how this aligns with the fact that Signal * has no tests [1], * has no CI [2]. How can the security of a software like Signal be asserted so thoroughly when on the engineering side, basic best practices are not followed and there is no automation that ensures that the important code paths work as expected? Many Signal features like voice calls, video calls, reliable message delivery, or running-wihtout-crash, break regularly in daily use and with new updates. They have bugs. What gives us (or you) confidence that the safety-critical aspects of Signal are magically exempt from such frequent bugs? This is a serious question that concerns me. Thanks! (8-years Signal user with upstreamed patches.) [1] There is a "test" directory, but it is negligible: 900 lines of actual test code in Signal-Android, vs >100k lines Java app source code. [2] At least I could not find any; tests on `master` did not even compile; see https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/issues/7458#issuecomment-375722083 https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/issues/7458#issu...
  - mirimir 7y ago
    How do you use Signal without a phone number? I mean: > Requirements > Signal uses your existing phone number. > The number must be able to receive an SMS or phone call. https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007318691-Register-a-phone-number https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007318691-Re... You can't use one of those shared SMS services. So what, lease a SIM from some SIM farm in wherever, and hope that they're honest? No privacy-conscious system would require phone numbers.
reshie 7y ago
its just a means of public key visibility and a nice service with automated importing and searchable. i have known some to give their keys on their site or service page though. remember you can upload just about any info on keys servers similar emails name; the key string is "key" though. this poisoning seems to be for the key server itself so you may not get the server you are looking for.

danShumway 7y ago

This is my reaction as well. This seems bad, but... what should I do? What's the alternative? I've seen multiple people say that PGP in general is kind of bad and it would be easy for the tech industry to write a secure alternative if it really wanted to. Cool, but that's not useful right now to ordinary people like me who aren't crypto experts who are trying to decide how we should sign/encrypt messages. I have no idea what I would use as an alternative to PGP.

tptacek 7y ago
To send messages, use a secure messenger, like Signal or Wire. Don't use PGP.
- faho 7y ago
  Okay, and to sign commits or emails? To encrypt files?
  - tptacek 7y ago
    Don't encrypt and sign emails.
    - danShumway 7y ago
      This is not a realistic solution. SMS-sized messages are the least hard part of this for me. What I want is to be able to point at a file or folder on my computer and say, "sign that with a public key so I can prove I wrote it" or "encrypt that with someone else's public key so only they can read it". At that point, I don't necessary care all that much about how the file gets sent over the network. It doesn't need to be integrated into email, but it does need to be a low-level enough operation that I can use it on an arbitrary block of text, file, or folder of any size. Is there a replacement that does that? I use Signal, and it's great. But Signal is not a replacement for PGP, it's a replacement for one, very specific use-case for PGP.
      - jrockway 7y ago
        I haven't used it for this, but I think Keybase might be a good system for filling the role of keyservers. If you just want encrypted messaging, it has it. But you can also store your PGP key in there and people can trust it if they trust Keybase's other proofs (which are not necessarily a leap of faith, you can go to the source and verify them).
      - tptacek 7y ago
        You asked (among other things) how to send messages securely without PGP. Don't use PGP to send secure messages; use a secure messenger, like Signal or Wire. Someone else asked how to email securely without PGP. Email isn't secure with PGP. Don't use PGP to send encrypt emails, and don't use email to send secure messages; use a secure messenger, like Signal or Wire. I acknowledge there are use cases not well covered by secure messengers. The current state of file encryption, which is practically the "hello world" of encryption problems, is a travesty. If you're simply looking to sign something, and later verify that it was you who signed it, use minisign. But that's a very narrow use case.
        rocqua 7y ago
        > The current state of file encryption, which is practically the "hello world" of encryption problems, is a travesty. Do you know of any projects that are aiming to solve this? It feels like all that is needed is a halfway decent standard file format, and some tools to bootstrap it. That seems to be how we got TLS and SSH, which are the two successes of encryption. I suppose those two protocols have the advantage of interactive negotiation. Whereas software encrypting a file does not get to negotiate any parameters with the software that will later be decrypting it. Moreover, those protocols had some decent weight behind it. Secure data transport is a problem that matters to essentially everyone these days. Whereas secure and portable file encryption really does not. E-mail is a significant use-case, but only tangentially, and optimal E-mail solutions are not really optimal portable file solutions.
        iancarroll 7y ago
        My money is on `age` right now. https://twitter.com/FiloSottile/status/1128865803938480128 https://twitter.com/FiloSottile/status/1128865803938480128
  - rkeene2 7y ago
    To sign or encrypt emails you could use S/MIME. It is much more widely supported than PGP for signing and encrypting emails as well.
    - tptacek 7y ago
      S/MIME is even worse than PGP. Don't use it.
- rmrfrmrf 7y ago
  Proprietary messengers are never secure.
  - AnaniasAnanas 7y ago
    Both Signal and Wire are FOSS though.
- nh2 7y ago
  @tptacek I have seen various endorsements of Signal from you, Bruce Schneier, Edward Snowden and so on. I am honestly curious about how this aligns with the fact that Signal * has no tests [1], * has no CI [2]. How can the security of a software like Signal be asserted so thoroughly when on the engineering side, basic best practices are not followed and there is no automation that ensures that the important code paths work as expected? Many Signal features like voice calls, video calls, reliable message delivery, or running-wihtout-crash, break regularly in daily use and with new updates. They have bugs. What gives us (or you) confidence that the safety-critical aspects of Signal are magically exempt from such frequent bugs? This is a serious question that concerns me. Thanks! (8-years Signal user with upstreamed patches.) [1] There is a "test" directory, but it is negligible: 900 lines of actual test code in Signal-Android, vs >100k lines Java app source code. [2] At least I could not find any; tests on `master` did not even compile; see https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/issues/7458#issuecomment-375722083 https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/issues/7458#issu...
- mirimir 7y ago
  How do you use Signal without a phone number? I mean: > Requirements > Signal uses your existing phone number. > The number must be able to receive an SMS or phone call. https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007318691-Register-a-phone-number https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007318691-Re... You can't use one of those shared SMS services. So what, lease a SIM from some SIM farm in wherever, and hope that they're honest? No privacy-conscious system would require phone numbers.

reshie 7y ago

its just a means of public key visibility and a nice service with automated importing and searchable. i have known some to give their keys on their site or service page though. remember you can upload just about any info on keys servers similar emails name; the key string is "key" though. this poisoning seems to be for the key server itself so you may not get the server you are looking for.