FireGPG Email Security
It’s unfortunate that not many people use email security/validation. For those with Firefox (gmail, or any webmail client) I would highly suggest trying the FireGPG extension. You have to install GnuPGP but there are directions for such.
Lifehacker has some good links for getting it to work.
Howto steps for FireGPG with Firefox on Windows
- Download WinPT & GnuPGP: install page or direct link (v1.1.3)
- Accept all the default options for the install (click Next a lot)
- When it finishes, run the WinPT program from the start menu
- Select the default of create a new key pair
- Put in your desired Name and email address
- Wait while the keys are generated (generally moving your mouse helps the process as random positions of the mouse are used to generate these keys)
- Backup your Public and Private Key somewhere safe!
- Install the FireGPG extension: install page or direct link
- You will have to add getfiregpg.org to your ‘allowed’ list for installing extensions
- Restart Firefox
- Now you can sign/encrypt text by selecting it and right-clicking->FireGPG->sign or encrypt
- If you use GMail, there will be neat buttons in your compose mail section for FireGPG
FireGPG’s functionality is primarily through the right-click menu, so check that out.
i.e. to send your public key to others, so they can send you encrypted email:
- right click (almost anywhere in firefox)->FireGPG->Export->(select your Public Key).
- copy that whole block of text
- paste it into your message!
Anyone who does have PGP setup can import my public key
For those using the Thunderbird email client, there is Enigmail which adds GPG encryption/decryption. Also keep in mind that you always want to use SSL or TLS to encrypt the link between you and your email server or service. Otherwise, even if the message is encrypted, the header’s to/from information is still in plain text.
More on this subject can be found at http://www.novo-ordo.com including a list of secure email providers.
For those of you who like the windows version of Gnupg please go here…. http://www.gpg4win.org/
They have a plugin for Outlook. Works very well!