Implementation questions

Jason Burnett jason at monkeypr0n.org
Wed Apr 7 10:54:39 CEST 2004


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on Wed Apr 07 Atom 'Smasher' spoke forth with the blessed manuscript
> > Thanks for the reply, the email being encrypted was not a huge concern,
> > we would only use that for corporate communication and if the recipient
> > left then the sender would know what was in the email.
> ================

> experiment:
> 1) install my public key
> 2) $ chmod 0 ~/.gnupg/gpg.conf
> 3) $ ps | gpg -ear 0x3D7D41E3

> you're the sender, i'm the recipient. as the sender of that message, see
> if you can decrypt it... i'll be *very* impressed if you can.

> my point, here, is that you can't always count on the sender encrypting to
> themself. and what if the sender and recipient both get hit by a bus?
You are correct, but hopefully we would be able to educate the users
enough to perform this function. 


> > We were more looking along the lines of storing customer info
> > (passwords) where multiple sysadmins could access/decrypt the info and
> ================

> data can be ENcrypted on auto-pilot to as many keys as you want, and sent
> to a file, database, etc....
I can't seem to find any docs on encrypting to multiple keys, I encrypt
my important files all the time, do you have a URL or some info
on how to encrypt to multiple keys? or am I overanalyzing this function? 
I have been up all night trying to rebuild a crashed server, so
overlooking simple info is not out of the question right now.

> > the scenario our suit likes to use "What if your all hit by a bus at the
> > same time?" he would be able to decrypt the passwords and pass them on
> > to the replacment team.
> ================

> one of the encryption keys could belong to the boss... they never plan on
> getting hit by a bus. also, you might want to print out your private key,
> write out your secret password on it, put it in an envelope, and store
> that in a locked safe, under control of the boss. when all of the techs
> get hit by a meteorite, the new techs can recover the keys from the safe.


> > Once a file is encrypted to multiple keys is there a way to remove one
> > of the keys from being able to decrypt it? Sort of like revoking a key?
> ================

> that's tough.... i can't think of a way to do that. even if you could
> "revoke" the key, let's say one of the employees emails the database to
> himself, and then gets fired: he's home with a copy of the db and his
> secret key.
This is something we will not be able to overcome, the employees need
access to the information and could make copies of it before they let us
know they are leaving. We have to trust that our HR department performs
proper background checks before hiring someone (they said they did).

> the best thing i can think of (at 0400 hrs) to deal with that, is to have
> a file/db encrypted to each employee. if an employee leaves, that file/db
> can be deleted.... but it won't do any good to delete it if they already
> saved their own copy  ;)
Our main goal is to make sure that, as long our employees maintain
proper personal security, that the data is fairly safe from prying eyes.

I appreciate the help and I feel your pain about trying to think
straight at 0400, I really didnt expect a response to this tonight, nice
surprise, something for me to do while harddrives format.

> 	...atom

>  _________________________________________
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