[3998] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: Mailinglist programs with PGP-encryption?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Alan Olsen)
Mon Jan 18 16:45:44 1999
From: "Alan Olsen" <alano@adams.pcx.ncd.com>
Date: Mon, 18 Jan 1999 13:11:40 -0800
In-Reply-To: Michael Motyka <mmotyka@lsil.com>
"Re: Mailinglist programs with PGP-encryption?" (Jan 15, 4:43pm)
To: mmotyka@lsil.com, Jukka E Isosaari <jei@zor.hut.fi>
Cc: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net, coderpunks@toad.com, cryptography@c2.net,
mac-crypto@vmeng.com
On Jan 15, 4:43pm, Michael Motyka wrote:
> It doesn't sound particularly difficult but I don't get the point - if
> anyone can subscribe to the list a la majordomo then what's the point of
> encrypting the mail?
>
> You would need to restrict subscription for encryption to make sense.
> Even then, the larger the list the more likely it is to get infiltrated.
This at least gets rid of the snoops who want to read the list trafic without
an announced presence. (Be it governments or just nosey sysadmins.)
Just make sure that your mail application supports PGP in some easy to use
fashion. Otherwise reading such a list becomes a MAJOR chore. (How many times
do you get to type in your passphrase today?)
The other problem with pgpdomo is that each message is encrypted once to all
participants. Therefore you can see all of the keys that the message is
encrypted to. This can be good and bad. For one thing, you can see if someone
you do not know is on the list. However some plug-ins for PGP do not deal well
with 100+ keys on the encryption list and scroll right off the end of the
screen. ('OK' button and all.)
Something worth striving for, but definitly in the beta stages of usefulness.
--
Alan Olsen
