Re: Using PGP on Insecure Machines

[Rick Busdiecker <rfb@lehman.com>]

    From: "Timothy C. May" <tcmay@netcom.com>
    Date: Tue, 23 Aug 1994 23:30:18 -0700 (PDT)
    
    Yes, some of you PGP fans may say "Sigh!" when you hear that I don't
    particularly like downloading-and-then-decrypting a message only to
    find it saying, "Gee, Tim, isn't this PGP stuff really neat?" Too bad.

Actually, my sigh included a bit of ``Gee, I thought this guy was
supposed to be one of the mega-rich, so why's he so low-tech that he
can't run PGP, etc at home.''

As to the security, using PGP in the way that I do routinely is more
secure than not using it -- the number of people who have the special
access that would ease the cracking effort is limited.  Also, the key
that I advertise is not my only key.  To the best of my knowledge, my
secure key pair has never had either the public or private part touch
a hard disk, much less a network.
    
    I'm happy that you PGP fans are thoroughly infatuated with using PGP
    for everything. Just knock off the clucking and sighing about those
    who don't see it as the end-all and be-all of today's communications.
    
    It reeks of fanaticism.

Oh puhleeeze . . . . 

Trying to get strong crypto to be commonplace is hardly the most
fanatical thing that gets discussed on this list.

			Rick