CLI for Noobies: A Primer on the Linux Command Line

Chapter 53. Sending and Reading Secret Mail

In Chapter 52, “The Key to GnuPG,” we went over the basics of creating key-pairs: the public and secret versions of your GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG) keys. But if you’re a government employee who wants to become a whistle-blower and report corruption, evil-doers, or gross mismanagement, you’ll need to do more than create your keys. You’ll need to encrypt and sign the email you send me with the details of your exposé.

A private key is just that: private. You protect it. You don’t share it, don’t publish it, and don’t email it to friends. You only need access to your private key—that’s when you’re asked for your passphrase—when you are going to read data encrypted with your public key, or when you create a ...