Signature, fingerprint or public key?

[Anthony E . Greene]

On Mon, 02 Apr 2001 05:45:24 Subba Rao wrote:
>1. What is the commonly used means of identification? This is for email
>   identification and document/Web Pages authetication etc.? Is it public
>key, Signature or fingerprint?

I suspect you mean "What is the commonly used means of authentication?" This
is not a simple subject, but I will attempt to answer only the question that
I think you are asking.

To associate an electronic object (email message, web page, other electronic
document) with a person, that person should sign the object using PGP/GPG.

A public key is just a means of checking the signature. A fingerprint is
just a way to identify a public key.

>I get my public key listed. At the default key size (1024 bits), the output
>is rather large. I would hesitate to add my public key as a means of
>identification, for a 2 or 3 line email note.

You do not need to include your public key in email messages, just include
your keyid. The keyid can be used to retrieve your key from key servers.

Tony
-- 
Anthony E. Greene <agreene@pobox.com> <http://www.pobox.com/~agreene/>
PGP Key: 0x6C94239D/7B3D BD7D 7D91 1B44 BA26  C484 A42A 60DD 6C94 239D
Chat:  AOL/Yahoo: TonyG05    ICQ: 91183266
Linux. The choice of a GNU Generation. <http://www.linux.org/>