Documentation PSELS

Secure Email List Service

SELS GnuPG Primer

Importing keys from SELS email message ``Accept list-name ..." into GnuPG keyring

The graphic below illustrates the process you as List Subscriber must follow in order to obtain and import keys for the secure list you are subscribed to.

Email message from LM email message from LM decrypted

For some email clients such as Mozilla Thunderbird, the decryption and importing of keys can be done through the GUI interface provided by the email client and GnuPG plugin. However this is not supported for most email clients. In such cases using GnuPG commands is the simplest and safest way to ensure that keys are correctly imported to key manager.

First, you should save the signed and encrypted PGP block from the email message to a file say enc.gpg, including the BEGIN PGP MESSASE and END PGP MESSASE lines.

Second, you should execute the following GnuPG command to decrypt the message and use the passphrase provided by the List Moderator, when prompted.

gpg --decrypt enc.gpg > keys.gpg

Third, you should execute the following command to decode the keys sent by the List Moderator.

gpg --decrypt keys.gpg > keys

This command will also verify LM's signature on the message. Please make sure that the signature verification succeeds.

The keys are now available in a file named keys.

Fourth, you should now import these keys into your keyring with the import command.

gpg --import --allow-secret-key-import keys

You must then delete all the temporary files generated in this process.