4 ms·

It'd be cool to see this without PGP. Signatures via signify/minisign are superior in every way.

by na85 5y ago

georgyo 5y ago
> are superior in every way. Besides the fact that a signify/minisign are a raw key instead of being padded with identity information, in what way are they actually better? Similarly, minisign makes no claims at identity at all. You get a random string, and the user is responsible for knowing which key is for what user. The minisign public key contains nothing but the key. To me, that is a horrible user experience. A PGP public key contains many bits of information besides just the key, and that is how this is even possible. PGP tools are install nearly everywhere (except windows) by default, while minisign is an extra install. PGP's web-key-directory is making knowing the right for a user trivial and tamper resistant. IE: https://keyoxide.org/wkd/george%40shamm.as https://keyoxide.org/wkd/george%40shamm.as It's hard for me to see any benefits of minisign really besides key size. Calling it "superior in every way." is straight troll bait.
- robinhoodsghost 5y ago
  Nah troll baiting is saying "PGP tools are installed nearly everywhere (except windows) by default" when windows still has almost 80% market share on PCs. Most of the rest are on macos. If you want something to be useful that relies on network effects then they, and mobile users are who you need to accommodate. Linux on the desktop users are a rounding error.
  - forgotmypw17 5y ago
    They might not be installed, but they are available for easy installation, with GUI and without. There are also APIs and libraries for every major language.
  - djbusby 5y ago
    Is 2% a rounding error? https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide
    - arthurcolle 5y ago
      A statistically significant rounding error
- Seirdy 5y ago
  PGP is bloated and complex, trying to be the Swiss Army Chainsaw of encryption and verification. It lacks modern features of encryption tools such as channel binding (which opens whole categories of exploits) and perfect forward secrecy (instead preferring to use long-lived keys, which are a nightmare of their own). PGP also allows a host of insecure options without mandating secure ones: while it does offer good algos and distribution mechanisms (e.g. WKD), it also offers poor/deprecated algos and disasters like keyserver pools. As for Signify: Minisign supports trusted and untrusted comments in signatures to supply metadata. Some distributions like OpenBSD and Void Linux have finally upgraded their package signing from PGP to Signify; Debian is in the process of migrating from PGP to Ed25519 sigs (https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Apt/Spec/AptSign https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Apt/Spec/AptSign). If we manage to switch enough distros off PGP, maybe we can remove the need to have PGP installed by default.
  - upofadown 5y ago
    >PGP is bloated and complex... Not in any relative sense. The commonly used Signal protocol for example is much more complex and is only applicable to one narrow category of application. In the Keyoxide case we are only doing signing so that is the only part of the OpenPGP standard that would be applicable. >...channel binding... Could you expand on how that might relate to PGP applications? >...perfect forward secrecy... ... is not relevant for the protection of things like files. Even for messaging it is rarely of any value as users like to keep their old messages around. >...poor/deprecated algos... See my other reply: * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29138592 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29138592 ...OpenBSD... OpenBSD needed something compatible with the license of the base distribution. The mistake made was that signify was not made to use a preexisting format. So it is an attempt to create a whole new standard in a way that provides no benefit to anyone.
    - Seirdy 5y ago
      > In the Keyoxide case we are only doing signing so that is the only part of the OpenPGP standard that would be applicable. The problem is that PGP does a lot of stuff besides signing too; this is bad design, and is one in a long list of issues with PGP. Its network effect extends to areas where issues like the lack of channel binding and PFS are relevant (e.g. communication platforms): people use the "it's already installed (for something else)" argument far too often to justify using it for something it isn't suited for (most other things). > OpenBSD needed something compatible with the license of the base distribution. The mistake made was that signify was not made to use a preexisting format. So it is an attempt to create a whole new standard in a way that provides no benefit to anyone. Signify's standard is dead simple, and already has several implementations. The friction involved in adopting it is low enough for this to be a minor concern. The benefit is that it helps us move away from complex dependencies like GPG and towards simple ones like minisign/signify that only do what's necessary.
forgotmypw17 5y ago
Excuse me, but does your alternative provide toolchains and user interfaces for every major platform in existence today, including Mac, *nix, iOS, Android, Windows, a library for every major language in existence, and 25 years of attempts to break it? If not, I don't see how you can claim it is superior in every way, because here are at least two ways in which PGP/GPG are by far superior.
- na85 5y ago
  I dunno about windows but minisign is on Mac and Linux, yes. As for 25 years to break it, well, go look at CVEs for GnuPG. There have been many.
  - forgotmypw17 5y ago
    The algorithms still stand 25 years later. Is it also available for iOS and Android? FreeBSD? Are there libraries for Perl and PHP?
    - na85 5y ago
      > The algorithms still stand 25 years later. They don't, though.
      - forgotmypw17 5y ago
        Both RSA and ECC still stand strong, AFAIK. What are you saying here?
        na85 5y ago
        I was referring to CAST5
        forgotmypw17 5y ago
        Based on my reading, there are no serious known issues with CAST5, with a minor issue being its small block size. [1] Is there anything else? [1] https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/24045/is-cast5-still-a-secure-algorithm-to-use https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/24045/is-cast5-st...
selfhoster11 5y ago
PGP/GPG has much broader adoption, and is not fundamentally broken as a standard. It's also what people are used to. I don't know what to do with a minisign key.
0xdeadb00f 5y ago
PGP sucks in general. But it seems to be the only thing in it's own space. When will there be a viable alternative to it? age doesn't support signing, keys are meant to be ephemeral. minisign/signify are not a suitable equivalent and are more suited to signing+verifying software releases.

It'd be cool to see this without PGP. Signatures via signify/minisign are superior in every way.

by na85 5y ago

It'd be cool to see this without PGP. Signatures via signify/minisign are superior in every way.

> are superior in every way. Besides the fact that a signify/minisign are a raw key instead of being padded with identity information, in what way are they actually better? Similarly, minisign makes no claims at identity at all. You get a random string, and the user is responsible for knowing which key is for what user. The minisign public key contains nothing but the key. To me, that is a horrible user experience. A PGP public key contains many bits of information besides just the key, and that is how this is even possible. PGP tools are install nearly everywhere (except windows) by default, while minisign is an extra install. PGP's web-key-directory is making knowing the right for a user trivial and tamper resistant. IE: https://keyoxide.org/wkd/george%40shamm.as https://keyoxide.org/wkd/george%40shamm.as It's hard for me to see any benefits of minisign really besides key size. Calling it "superior in every way." is straight troll bait.

robinhoodsghost 5y ago
Nah troll baiting is saying "PGP tools are installed nearly everywhere (except windows) by default" when windows still has almost 80% market share on PCs. Most of the rest are on macos. If you want something to be useful that relies on network effects then they, and mobile users are who you need to accommodate. Linux on the desktop users are a rounding error.
- forgotmypw17 5y ago
  They might not be installed, but they are available for easy installation, with GUI and without. There are also APIs and libraries for every major language.
- djbusby 5y ago
  Is 2% a rounding error? https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide
  - arthurcolle 5y ago
    A statistically significant rounding error
Seirdy 5y ago
PGP is bloated and complex, trying to be the Swiss Army Chainsaw of encryption and verification. It lacks modern features of encryption tools such as channel binding (which opens whole categories of exploits) and perfect forward secrecy (instead preferring to use long-lived keys, which are a nightmare of their own). PGP also allows a host of insecure options without mandating secure ones: while it does offer good algos and distribution mechanisms (e.g. WKD), it also offers poor/deprecated algos and disasters like keyserver pools. As for Signify: Minisign supports trusted and untrusted comments in signatures to supply metadata. Some distributions like OpenBSD and Void Linux have finally upgraded their package signing from PGP to Signify; Debian is in the process of migrating from PGP to Ed25519 sigs (https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Apt/Spec/AptSign https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Apt/Spec/AptSign). If we manage to switch enough distros off PGP, maybe we can remove the need to have PGP installed by default.
- upofadown 5y ago
  >PGP is bloated and complex... Not in any relative sense. The commonly used Signal protocol for example is much more complex and is only applicable to one narrow category of application. In the Keyoxide case we are only doing signing so that is the only part of the OpenPGP standard that would be applicable. >...channel binding... Could you expand on how that might relate to PGP applications? >...perfect forward secrecy... ... is not relevant for the protection of things like files. Even for messaging it is rarely of any value as users like to keep their old messages around. >...poor/deprecated algos... See my other reply: * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29138592 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29138592 ...OpenBSD... OpenBSD needed something compatible with the license of the base distribution. The mistake made was that signify was not made to use a preexisting format. So it is an attempt to create a whole new standard in a way that provides no benefit to anyone.
  - Seirdy 5y ago
    > In the Keyoxide case we are only doing signing so that is the only part of the OpenPGP standard that would be applicable. The problem is that PGP does a lot of stuff besides signing too; this is bad design, and is one in a long list of issues with PGP. Its network effect extends to areas where issues like the lack of channel binding and PFS are relevant (e.g. communication platforms): people use the "it's already installed (for something else)" argument far too often to justify using it for something it isn't suited for (most other things). > OpenBSD needed something compatible with the license of the base distribution. The mistake made was that signify was not made to use a preexisting format. So it is an attempt to create a whole new standard in a way that provides no benefit to anyone. Signify's standard is dead simple, and already has several implementations. The friction involved in adopting it is low enough for this to be a minor concern. The benefit is that it helps us move away from complex dependencies like GPG and towards simple ones like minisign/signify that only do what's necessary.

forgotmypw17 5y ago

Excuse me, but does your alternative provide toolchains and user interfaces for every major platform in existence today, including Mac, *nix, iOS, Android, Windows, a library for every major language in existence, and 25 years of attempts to break it? If not, I don't see how you can claim it is superior in every way, because here are at least two ways in which PGP/GPG are by far superior.

na85 5y ago
I dunno about windows but minisign is on Mac and Linux, yes. As for 25 years to break it, well, go look at CVEs for GnuPG. There have been many.
- forgotmypw17 5y ago
  The algorithms still stand 25 years later. Is it also available for iOS and Android? FreeBSD? Are there libraries for Perl and PHP?
  - na85 5y ago
    > The algorithms still stand 25 years later. They don't, though.
    - forgotmypw17 5y ago
      Both RSA and ECC still stand strong, AFAIK. What are you saying here?
      - na85 5y ago
        I was referring to CAST5
        forgotmypw17 5y ago
        Based on my reading, there are no serious known issues with CAST5, with a minor issue being its small block size. [1] Is there anything else? [1] https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/24045/is-cast5-still-a-secure-algorithm-to-use https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/24045/is-cast5-st...

selfhoster11 5y ago

PGP/GPG has much broader adoption, and is not fundamentally broken as a standard. It's also what people are used to. I don't know what to do with a minisign key.

0xdeadb00f 5y ago

PGP sucks in general. But it seems to be the only thing in it's own space. When will there be a viable alternative to it? age doesn't support signing, keys are meant to be ephemeral. minisign/signify are not a suitable equivalent and are more suited to signing+verifying software releases.