Very basic questions
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From: John Bischoff on 26 Mar 2010 21:19 Gentlemen Maybe I have the wrong venue, but than maybe one of you knowledgeable gents will kindly enlighten me. Last I heard, PGP provided pretty solid security. Is that still the case? Is there anything better, and about as easy to use, these days? I'll wish to encrypt a file up to several MB, and maybe a whole drive. I'll wish to use it for two-way, friend-to-friend file sharing. Naturally, the better the resistance to brute force the better. Thanks, gents John
From: Greg Rose on 26 Mar 2010 22:35 In article <osmqq51kp6ttfictta03qaerek6861feee(a)4ax.com>, John Bischoff <mingol(a)roadrunner.com> wrote: >Last I heard, PGP provided pretty solid security. Is that still the case? It is well studied, and backed by reputable professionals. It is very solid, IMO. The company I work for supplies it standard for all employees (although many don't use it, or anything at all). I use it on a daily basis, and have never had a problem. >Is there anything better, and about as easy to use, these days? I hear good things about TrueCrypt, but PGP solves my problems, so I've never felt a need to try it. >I'll wish to encrypt a file up to several MB, and maybe a whole drive. No problem with PGP. >I'll wish to use it for two-way, friend-to-friend file sharing. >Naturally, the better the resistance to brute force the better. Brute force will not be a serious consideration for a reputable product, so "better" isn't really a meaningful thing here. Ease of use, flexibility, stuff like that, should be used to determine "better". Greg. --
From: George Orwell on 27 Mar 2010 06:06 "John Bischoff" <mingol(a)roadrunner.com> wrote in message news:osmqq51kp6ttfictta03qaerek6861feee(a)4ax.com... > Gentlemen > Maybe I have the wrong venue, but than maybe one of you knowledgeable gents will > kindly enlighten me. > Last I heard, PGP provided pretty solid security. Is that still the case? > Is there anything better, and about as easy to use, these days? > I'll wish to encrypt a file up to several MB, and maybe a whole drive. > I'll wish to use it for two-way, friend-to-friend file sharing. > Naturally, the better the resistance to brute force the better. > Thanks, gents > John I'd opt for Truecrypt or even better, FreeOTFE. FreeOTFE especially is so good that it's quietly being blocked or at the least discouraged in certain European countries. Il mittente di questo messaggio|The sender address of this non corrisponde ad un utente |message is not related to a real reale ma all'indirizzo fittizio|person but to a fake address of an di un sistema anonimizzatore |anonymous system Per maggiori informazioni |For more info https://www.mixmaster.it
From: David Eather on 27 Mar 2010 08:29 On 27/03/2010 11:19 AM, John Bischoff wrote: > Gentlemen > Maybe I have the wrong venue, but than maybe one of you knowledgeable gents will > kindly enlighten me. > Last I heard, PGP provided pretty solid security. Is that still the case? > Is there anything better, and about as easy to use, these days? > I'll wish to encrypt a file up to several MB, and maybe a whole drive. > I'll wish to use it for two-way, friend-to-friend file sharing. > Naturally, the better the resistance to brute force the better. > Thanks, gents > John I agree with Greg Rose. PGP is pretty magic. If you want to use full disk encryption I would suggest you *thoroughly* test your drive for errors before encrypting. Also if you encrypt your drive you need to make sure your backups are as secure as your computer drive is. I backup onto resizeable PGP dynamic sized disks created on USB external drives. Make sure to wipe free space on the USB drive after backups or resizing. Alternatively, if you have lots of space for backup use fixed sized virtual drives so you don't have to worry about wiping.
From: unruh on 27 Mar 2010 13:40
On 2010-03-27, John Bischoff <mingol(a)roadrunner.com> wrote: > Gentlemen > Maybe I have the wrong venue, but than maybe one of you knowledgeable gents will > kindly enlighten me. > Last I heard, PGP provided pretty solid security. Is that still the case? > Is there anything better, and about as easy to use, these days? > I'll wish to encrypt a file up to several MB, and maybe a whole drive. PGP is a message system. For simply encrypting files it uses one of a list of standard encryption algorithms, and is not better or worse than a standalone program that just does that encryption. The whole public key infrastructure that PGP is based on is irrelevant for file encryption. > I'll wish to use it for two-way, friend-to-friend file sharing. That is what ssh, scp, ssl is designed for. > Naturally, the better the resistance to brute force the better. That is not the problem. The problem is the key protection, which I suspect will be terrible. Are you willing to give up your life to protect your key? Are you willing to devote a single computer solely to the task, which you wipe and reinstall every night? If not, brute force is not the issue. > Thanks, gents > John |