Problem with Encryption of Mails

[Torsten Villnow]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Neil Williams [mailto:linux at codehelp.co.uk]
> Sent: Monday, October 20, 2003 9:02 AM
> To: Torsten Villnow
> Subject: Re: Problem with Encryption of Mails

I seem to be getting confused ...

> > (1)
> > the decryption of a mail, which the sender encrypted with both my public
> > key AND his own key (*) fails;
>
> Umm, it should. If it's encrypted with both keys, you mean that
> the block is:
>
> Start message encrypted to you
> Start message encrypted to himself
> End message encrypted to himself
> End message encrypted to you.
>
> You will only ever be able to decrypt the outer wrap. It's the correct
> behaviour.
>
> Incidentally, without YOUR secret key, your mate cannot decrypt
> the message at
> all - the block he can decrypt is hidden inside a block he cannot
> decrypt.

... I can encrypt a file (using the file manager of WinPT) with both my
buddy's public key and my own key. That one single file I can decrypt
afterwards again, after having entered my own passphrase. The same is
possible with mails I generate.

> (Unless you two are sharing secret keys! Or not using the default
> public/private key structure.)
>
> When people encrypt to themselves and to the recipient it is normally a
> SEPARATE process. e.g. if I was to encrypt to you, the message
> sent to you
> would only be encrypted with your public key. A COPY of the
> message before
> encryption is then encrypted using my public key and stored in
> Sent Items -
> it never leaves my machine. The mail client handles this transparently.

no - at least not ony ma machine ... :-)

I currently encrypt the mail's body via the clip board, so the mail client
(Outlook 2000) does not interfere during the encryption process. So I
manually generate only one physical mail, and that mail I can decrypt
afterwards again. And my buddy can encrypt this mail as well (using PGP).

Torsten Villnow