symmetric encryption is not working

[Charles E. Blair]

   I have been using gpg (GnuPG) 2.1.18 on a debian linux
for several years.  In the last few days, I have noticed
that symmetric encryption is not working.

The command

gpg -c --cipher-algo AES testfile

creates testfile.gpg after asking for a passphrase.

However, the command

gpg testfile.gpg yields the message

> gpg: WARNING: no command supplied.  Trying to guess what you mean ...
> gpg: AES encrypted data
> gpg: encrypted with 1 passphrase

and creates a plaintext file without asking for
a passphrase.


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gpg: F7C9 B577 1E5D C732 63F1  A9D2 A399 D202 50E8 50D1