About PGP and GnuPG

Did you get an email from me with some funny attachment? (perhaps named signature.asc)
It may look something like this:

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Comment: GPGTools - https://gpgtools.org iD8DBQFDwoJ+Q9aN0CLR+iARAvN2AJ9fNx2hgvrge1oWuT7w+xcMS2BxSQCeJ/Hi 5VFRwQWb+gJLKtnvvb4wKfk= =OqOR -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

This is a PGP signature (actually, I use GPGMail, a Mac front end of GnuPG), which helps to verify that this email really came from me.

In order for an email to have this signature, who ever sent the email must have had access to my personal computer, and they must have known the passphrase which unlocks my private encryption key.

Hence, if you see a signature like this, you can be essentially certain that I really sent that email.

Furthermore, if you enable PGP or GnuPG encryption on your own computer, then email sent between us can be fully encrypted, secure from the prying eyes that wander the Internet.

If you use PGP or GnuPG and would like to send me encrypted email or verify my identity, my public key is available here: http://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/~bcharbon/61E0C2B7-pubkey.asc

If you are a Mac user, I suggest you watch the Screen Cast Online Tutorial