I wonder if some of the usability frustrations would be eased if people adopted the convention of having a secure-only email address, where the only email it accepts is encrypted email. It probably would be easy to set it to bounce/delete any non-encrypted email. Maybe only check it using a separate email client. Traffic would be low so searching wouldn't be such a hassle. Use your other email address for receiving insecure email (and tell everyone that by default, their email addresses are insecure).
Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
61–70 of 74 posts
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#62It's fairly easy to get a good working PGP system on OSX - Symantec makes it obscure to get but it works well, at least for file encryption with options available in the Finder menu. https://www4.symantec.com/Vrt/offer?a_id=109355 No need to pay - you just need to go through the rigmarole of getting a trial registration.
I'd highly advise against this and instead suggest going with GPGMail or similar. Considering the NSA's documented influence on security companies, an encryption product from a large corporation is quite possibly the worst choice you could make.
That's a good point. Though keys we use were generated back before Symantec bought PGP - is it more reasonable to expect that files encrypted with Symantec's version might be tamper-able, rather than keys generated might be?
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
> First, I think we should rename the keys to 'locking key' and 'unlocking key'. Why not go a step further and call one ‘key’ and the other ‘lock’? So you can share (copies of) your lock freely with others, and if they want to send encrypted email to you, they take your ‘lock’ and put it on that email. It then becomes obvious that you shouldn’t share the private key (after all, anybody could then unlock the locks) an…
That would make for nice iconography - public keys being open padlocks, private keys being keys and encrypted things being closed padlocks.
was bored so made something - http://postimg.org/image/8sm7otl2p/full/
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem with the key exchange mechanism you've described is it's untrustworthy. The software would be essentially asking "is this initial email from the person you think it is?" which is a tough question to answer given the fact that emails can be readily spoofed. Granted, Bob's key will differ from Mallory's key, but there may be just enough time to do bad things before detection. Key exchange between people sho…
> Key exchange between people should always require some kind of offline verification. Or a trusted third party (see IBE.)
They have the same benefits and drawbacks of CAs.
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#65I think it's because there still isn't a good metaphor that covers up the complexity of public key encryption. Such a metaphor is a prerequisite for a UI that the average user can comprehend. First, I think we should rename the keys to 'locking key' and 'unlocking key'. I've had people still scratch their heads at 'public/private' a few days after I've completely explained the concept to them. They find it easier to…
> First, I think we should rename the keys to 'locking key' and 'unlocking key'. Why not go a step further and call one ‘key’ and the other ‘lock’? So you can share (copies of) your lock freely with others, and if they want to send encrypted email to you, they take your ‘lock’ and put it on that email. It then becomes obvious that you shouldn’t share the private key (after all, anybody could then unlock the locks) an…
Okay, thinking further: The (open) (pad)locks you distribute also carry a seal impression. Then:
- to encrypt, the user takes a padlock of the recipient and adds it to the message.
- to decrypt, the recipient uses his key to open the lock.
- to sign something, you use your key as a seal, creating a unique impression on the message
- to check a signature, the recipient compares the impression on the message with the impression on the lock.
Does that make at least some sense?
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#66The biggest problem with pgp/gps is webmails and search in your messages :/
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#67For two reasons: because it has a UX that hasn't changed meaningfully since the mid-1990s (GUI tools for GPG/PGP tend simply to wrap the command line UX), and because it presumes that the only reasonable way to use a tool like GPG is to exert fine-grained control over keys and identity. Email needs to be encrypted opportunistically, without user intervention. GPG could do this; it could generate semi-ephemeral keys a…
Someone should write a secure-by-default email client that uses the OpenPGP message format and is compatible with GPG, but that ignores the intended GPG security model entirely.
Someone (my company) is trying: https://parley.co
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
That would make for nice iconography - public keys being open padlocks, private keys being keys and encrypted things being closed padlocks.
was bored so made something - http://postimg.org/image/8sm7otl2p/full/
interesting! i can clearly understand what each means, but i think the average person might get confused. how about just the key and the open padlock? signed/encrypted content can have the icon on the side (kind of like the shortcut indicator in windows)?
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#69Huh, I don't see what I would have considered the obvious answer among what's already been said. So, to me, the obvious answer is that if you want to use PGP, you first have to make everyone you intend to communicate with also use PGP. That's an obvious no-go. I would be happy to set it up, but what good would that do me?
> if you want to use PGP, you first have to make everyone you intend to communicate with also use PGP
And that is probably even harder then getting people to quit facebook...
There should be a popular messenger that uses xmpp with otr by default.
Re: Ask HN: Why is PGP not used widely?
#70For two reasons: because it has a UX that hasn't changed meaningfully since the mid-1990s (GUI tools for GPG/PGP tend simply to wrap the command line UX), and because it presumes that the only reasonable way to use a tool like GPG is to exert fine-grained control over keys and identity. Email needs to be encrypted opportunistically, without user intervention. GPG could do this; it could generate semi-ephemeral keys a…
Yup. I have made an active use of GPG over the last few months, and there's a few big problems: 1. A UX that is... Hard. As you say. See the last few minutes of this talk I did: http://youtu.be/LjZk8PP-u3c 2. You can't PGP with webmail. 3. You can't PGP on mobile. 4. This means that unless you're on your desktop, you can't do things like search through older emails, which is really important. 5. It requires both peop…
1. Agreed.
2. http://www.mailvelope.com/ https://countermail.com/ http://www.hushmail.com/
3. http://code.google.com/p/k9mail/
4. Well, you could if you jump through some hoops. Which describes using PGP in general.
5. Not only that, it requires both people to use it _correctly_.