Subkey revocation means losing signatures?

David Shaw dshaw at jabberwocky.com
Wed Oct 19 14:39:57 CEST 2005


On Wed, Oct 19, 2005 at 02:30:31PM +0200, Realos wrote:
> hi,
> 
> >
> >yes adding a new one and revoking the old one. The original question was about modifyuing the uid.
> 
> I think I got the point. Deleting a UID results in loss of signatures 
> while revkong a UID doesn't if it signs the new UID prior to being deleted.

No.  Deleting a UID results in loss of signatures on that UID
(deleting a UID actually removes the signatures completely so they're
really lost).  Revoking a UID also results in loss of signatures on
that UID.  They're not deleted, but they are ignored from then on.

Signing a UID with another UID is not a meaningful statement.  UIDs
don't sign.

> What about creating an empty uid, i.e. without any email address and
> requesting people to sign that uid in addition to respective UIDs with
> email address?

Some people do this, and it can be useful in certain places (signing
keys), but it does not resolve the "this key is untrusted - use it
anyway?" question unless people select the key using the empty UID.

David



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