We have GOT TO make things simpler

[Phillip Susi]

Jeff Allen via Gnupg-users writes:
> The original poster, perhaps unintentionally, stated the real reason the
> masses have not adopted PGP, "Please do appreciate that the persons who
> we are convincing and instructing are not particularly interested in
> privacy."  That's it in a nutshell.  The masses are not particularly
> interested in privacy.  If they were, they'd abandon Gmail and Yahoo and
> all the other providers who make no excuse for the fact their economic
> model depends on users being not particularly interested in privacy.

Bingo!  And as long as the user is not interested in it, and won't learn
how to properly use it, all they will get is the veneer of privacy and
learn the hard way that they really aren't secure.  You just can't make
security idiot proof.

There was also mention of "legally binding digital signatures" in
practice.  So far, the ones I have seen are nothing more than a web site
that you log into with a username/password, click sign, and it adds a
nice forged signature to the pdf document with an attestation that the
server verified your identity at such and such a time.  That's not a
cryptographic signature in any way and only an idiot would consider it
"legally binding".  Yet that is exactly how I signed the contract to
purchase my house a little over two years ago.