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Yes, it does matter. PGP is by far the most common standard for signatures used in software distribution (Git tags, RPM packages, Yum repos, Deb repos, ad-hoc s

Yes, it does matter. PGP is by far the most common standard for signatures used in software distribution (Git tags, RPM packages, Yum repos, Deb repos, ad-hoc signature schemes, etc.), and nothing else is particularly close in terms of number of signatures verified per day. While the absolute number of verifications is a lot lower than it could be, there is still substantial inertia behind these current standards, including US government standards. I am also aware that you are actively involved in moving ecosystems away from PGP and towards solutions in the Sigstore ecosystem, so this is definitely not news to you. I understand you want the situation to change, but for now it's disingenuous to pretend like GPG in particular doesn't have the super majority of "market" share around signatures and that drama like this wouldn't have potential impact to a lot of folks.

tptacek 3y ago
How, exactly, would this (waves around at current drama) impact a lot of folks? Can you be specific about it?
woodruffw 3y ago
> Yes, it does matter. PGP is by far the most common standard for signatures used in software distribution No, that would be bespoke PKIs on various proprietary OSes. PGP is miniscule compared to any of these; it's not even a rounding error. This is true even when you juice the numbers with things like git signing (which is not only ignored by 99.9% of clients but doesn't even sign the relevant software artifact for end users). > I understand you want the situation to change, but for now it's disingenuous to pretend like GPG in particular doesn't have the super majority of "market" share around signatures and that drama like this wouldn't have potential impact to a lot of folks. If you know me, then you know I've run the numbers here[1]: even ecosystems that encouraged PGP use for decades have all the hallmarks of the signatures being completely unused. End users do not verify PGP signatures, signers do not maintain their keys; PGP's tooling encourages this behavior. I won't deny that workflows will be broken by moving away from PGP. But those workflows are (1) a tiny, tiny minority, and (2) overwhelmingly security theater, especially now that PGP's principle feature (the WoT) is dead. [1]: https://blog.yossarian.net/2023/05/21/PGP-signatures-on-PyPI-worse-than-useless https://blog.yossarian.net/2023/05/21/PGP-signatures-on-PyPI...
- computerenjoyer 3y ago
  OK, fair point regarding bespoke PKI on Windows/Mac being more common. I do agree with that. I'll amend my statement to: PGP is by far the most common standard for server-side software distribution. I'll also quickly add that I agree that git signing is worthless as currently implemented. I have read your blogpost and I agree that PyPI had unused and useless PGP support. I also agree that signatures are a waste of time when the client tooling does not verify by default. However, this is not true for the Linux distro packaging ecosystem where approximately all downloads have their signatures verified. Until you convince RedHat and Debian to move their packaging and repository formats to another standard, PGP will remain very relevant for production server software. Don't mistake me as a defender of PGP-the-standard. I have absolutely no opinion on its cryptography. I would happily use minisign or any other tool that used only modern cryptography to produce signatures. As a distributor of software though, I don't really get to decide how to sign, I am at the mercy of government and ecosystem standards, and as a result no other signature scheme is close to the level of use that PGP has for enterprises that run server-side software.
  - Avamander 3y ago
    > PGP is by far the most common standard for server-side software distribution. I have a strong suspicion AuthentiCode is similarly common, plus a certain winner outside the server space.
    - computerenjoyer 3y ago
      My guess is that there are a lot more "signature verification events" on Linux that pull from a deb or yum repository than there are on Windows servers, both because the mean server in terms of global usage seems to be Linux (though not the median, I'd think?) as well as because it seems like Linux folk rely an awful lot more on distribution repositories than Windows server users download things. Happy to be corrected if anyone has real numbers, though. My feelings are informed by my company's download statistics which may not be representative.
  - woodruffw 3y ago

tptacek 3y ago

How, exactly, would this (waves around at current drama) impact a lot of folks? Can you be specific about it?

woodruffw 3y ago

> Yes, it does matter. PGP is by far the most common standard for signatures used in software distribution No, that would be bespoke PKIs on various proprietary OSes. PGP is miniscule compared to any of these; it's not even a rounding error. This is true even when you juice the numbers with things like git signing (which is not only ignored by 99.9% of clients but doesn't even sign the relevant software artifact for end users). > I understand you want the situation to change, but for now it's disingenuous to pretend like GPG in particular doesn't have the super majority of "market" share around signatures and that drama like this wouldn't have potential impact to a lot of folks. If you know me, then you know I've run the numbers here[1]: even ecosystems that encouraged PGP use for decades have all the hallmarks of the signatures being completely unused. End users do not verify PGP signatures, signers do not maintain their keys; PGP's tooling encourages this behavior. I won't deny that workflows will be broken by moving away from PGP. But those workflows are (1) a tiny, tiny minority, and (2) overwhelmingly security theater, especially now that PGP's principle feature (the WoT) is dead. [1]: https://blog.yossarian.net/2023/05/21/PGP-signatures-on-PyPI-worse-than-useless https://blog.yossarian.net/2023/05/21/PGP-signatures-on-PyPI...

computerenjoyer 3y ago
OK, fair point regarding bespoke PKI on Windows/Mac being more common. I do agree with that. I'll amend my statement to: PGP is by far the most common standard for server-side software distribution. I'll also quickly add that I agree that git signing is worthless as currently implemented. I have read your blogpost and I agree that PyPI had unused and useless PGP support. I also agree that signatures are a waste of time when the client tooling does not verify by default. However, this is not true for the Linux distro packaging ecosystem where approximately all downloads have their signatures verified. Until you convince RedHat and Debian to move their packaging and repository formats to another standard, PGP will remain very relevant for production server software. Don't mistake me as a defender of PGP-the-standard. I have absolutely no opinion on its cryptography. I would happily use minisign or any other tool that used only modern cryptography to produce signatures. As a distributor of software though, I don't really get to decide how to sign, I am at the mercy of government and ecosystem standards, and as a result no other signature scheme is close to the level of use that PGP has for enterprises that run server-side software.
- Avamander 3y ago
  > PGP is by far the most common standard for server-side software distribution. I have a strong suspicion AuthentiCode is similarly common, plus a certain winner outside the server space.
  - computerenjoyer 3y ago
    My guess is that there are a lot more "signature verification events" on Linux that pull from a deb or yum repository than there are on Windows servers, both because the mean server in terms of global usage seems to be Linux (though not the median, I'd think?) as well as because it seems like Linux folk rely an awful lot more on distribution repositories than Windows server users download things. Happy to be corrected if anyone has real numbers, though. My feelings are informed by my company's download statistics which may not be representative.
- woodruffw 3y ago