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Using GPG to Encrypt Your Data

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Re: Using GPG to Encrypt Your Data

#2
>We suggest that you include five words of 5-10 letters in size, chosen at random, with spaces, special characters, and/or numbers embedded into words.

>You need to be able to recall the passphrase that was used to encrypt the file.

Why bother writing security guidelines which are impossible for a human to follow?

edit: Try recalling any passphrases generated by the command below, and that's before the random sprinkling of punctuation.

    grep -E "^[a-z]{5,10}$" /usr/share/dict/words | shuf -n5 | tr '\n' ' '

Re: Using GPG to Encrypt Your Data

#5
post #2

>We suggest that you include five words of 5-10 letters in size, chosen at random, with spaces, special characters, and/or numbers embedded into words. >You need to be able to recall the passphrase that was used to encrypt the file. Why bother writing security guidelines which are impossible for a human to follow? edit: Try recalling any passphrases generated by the command below, and that's before the random sprinkl…

Is it really impossible for a human to follow?

"Shiny C0rrect H0rse Battery Staple!"

Re: Using GPG to Encrypt Your Data

#6

Why would they not use asymmetric encryption?

GPG, of course, allows you to use asymmetric crypto and currently supports RSA, RSA-E, RSA-S, ELG-E, and DSA algorithms for that purpose.

But for bulk data encrypting good symmetric (AES, CAST5, etc.) is both more secure and significantly faster.

Re: Using GPG to Encrypt Your Data

#7
post #4

Why would they not use asymmetric encryption?

...and why encrypt stuff transferred with scp?

because encryption in transit != encryption at rest. Maybe you don't trust the server you are scp'ing the data to, with encryption at rest you dont' need to.

Re: Using GPG to Encrypt Your Data

#8
For GPG symmetric encryption, the kind the article describes, here are the best options I've found for my typical case:

   gpg --symmetric \
   --cipher-algo aes256 \
   --digest-algo sha256 \
   --cert-digest-algo sha256 \
   --compress-algo none -z 0 \
   --quiet --no-greeting \
   --no-use-agent "$@"
I keep this command here:

    https://github.com/SixArm/gpg-encrypt
The options are chosen to balance tradeoffs of convenience, strength, and portability.

Re: Using GPG to Encrypt Your Data

#9
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...and why encrypt stuff transferred with scp?

because encryption in transit != encryption at rest. Maybe you don't trust the server you are scp'ing the data to, with encryption at rest you dont' need to.

That's not what the documentation is about, though:

====

Use GPG with the cipher AES256, without the --armour option, and with compression to encrypt your files during inter-host transfers. GPG

Encryption helps protect your files during inter-host file transfers (for example, when using the scp, bbftp, or ftp commands). We recommend GPG (Gnu Privacy Guard), an Open Source OpenPGP-compatible encryption system.

===

scp shouldn't be in that list.

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