[openpgp] Secure and interoperable secret key transfer
Vincent Breitmoser <look@my.amazin.horse> Mon, 06 June 2016 18:35 UTC
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Date: Mon, 06 Jun 2016 20:35:11 +0200
From: Vincent Breitmoser <look@my.amazin.horse>
To: IETF OpenPGP <openpgp@ietf.org>
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Subject: [openpgp] Secure and interoperable secret key transfer
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Hi, there should be a standardized format to transfer secret keys in a way which provides confidentiality and integrity protection. At the moment, most tools leave the user completely on their own to perform this not too common but centrally important operation. While symmetric file encryption is a technically usable mechanism, the de facto state of the art is that no implementation enforces (or even encourages) its use for secret key transfer, or provides support for decryption on the import side. Which very likely means that many users move their keys around unprotected. The passphrase is not a suitable mechanism for this: It provides only partial confidentiality, no integrity protection, and most importantly its use for this purpose confuses users about what the actual purpose of the passphrase is - and how strong it should be for each use case. The tl;dr of this post is that I would really like to get rid of these two FAQ points of ours: https://www.openkeychain.org/faq/#how-to-import-an-openkeychain-backup-with-gpg https://www.openkeychain.org/faq/#what-is-the-best-way-to-transfer-my-own-key-to-openkeychain All this said, I'm not entirely sure what the best way to do this could be. Since symmetrically encrypted data packets exist, it's quite possible that just a paragraph encouraging its use for this purpose somewhere near the transferable secret key section would suffice. - V
- [openpgp] Secure and interoperable secret key tra… Vincent Breitmoser