Zimmerman, who was also involved in the development of VoIP encryption protocols (e.g., Zfone and ZRTP), managed to piece together an encryption system that was based on a gold combo: public-key cryptography (i.e., private-public key) hashing, symmetric-key encryption, and data compression. It was called PGP, which is short for Pretty Good Privacy. Enjoy and stay safe! What is PGP Encryption?īack in 1991, computer wizard Phil Zimmerman comes up with a new encryption program for email communications. We’ll talk about the history of PGP, legal conundrums, incidents, and more. And with privacy being synonymous with encryption, I’ll be taking you through PGP encryption. Today’s article is dedicated to one of the most crucial aspects of OTA (over-the-air) communication: privacy. From ARPANET to the more modern, AI-curated Internet, the need for efficient communication has remained unwavering.Įverything boils down to communication, whether you’re the underdog looking to impress the top brass or a simple customer asking the teller to gift-wrap your products. In extenso, these are also the vertebrae of the grand, worldwide web, a scaffolding around which we raise web pages and other types of resources.
Security and privacy are the pillars of any software development endeavor. This land of endless possibilities (and probabilities) which is the public domain has taken the stand more than – sometimes lobbying out for creative commons and other times denouncing itself for being a pool of resources in which any ill-intended user can cast a fishing rod. Standard version uses your \Users\foo folder as other GPG-based application does.Peter Thiel of Palantir Technologies and PayPal once said that every time an email is written, it gets broadcasted into the public domain, which is not as secure as people (end-users) tend, or led to – believe.
This version is portable so all your keys will be held in the same folder as you unpacked the version.
Encryption does not need anything, decryption needs your private key and might ask for the password for your key.Īll you need is to download ZIP archive: 32bit/ 64bit, unpack it and call for setup.bat file. Do not forget to add yourself if you want to read back your encrypted texts. Every time you want to send encrypted data for somebody, select their public keys from the list (multiple selections allowed). Now you’re ready to import/export files and texts and send it to your contact persons. So you need to select your private key, push to “Export Keys” button, and in the opened pull-down menu specify the output file name and specify “public keys” option. The last step you need to extract your public key from the system and send it to all your recipients (or publish somewhere like the corporate portal, so everybody will able to get your public keys), as follows: Do not forget to import all known public keys into WinGPG system, you might need as many keys as you have recipients.Ĩ. Great, now you have everything configured. Do not forget to check “Use default keys” option below the key list as displayed. Use right-click in the list for the selected key and then use “Set as default” menu point. Now you have your password protected private key and you need to make it default, as follows:
Click on “Create Keys” button and type the data in the pop-up window, like this:ħ. If you don’t have a private key, you need to create it. The GPG key will be imported into the system.Ħ. Locate them in the open dialog, select and click on ‘Open’ button. In case you already have used GPG-based software before, your keys will be imported automatically otherwise, there will be an empty list. Click on tray icon, and import the key as described below: The next step is to import your private key if it exists or generate if you don’t have one.
The installation has been completed, and a new icon appeared in Windows tray:ĥ. Once you press on “Finish” button, you see the following window:Ĥ.