Reykjavík Grapevine - 19.07.2013, Síða 33

33
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Reykjavík · Engjateigur 19 and Laugavegur 20b · Hafnarfjörður · Strandgata 34 · www.glo.is
This is Solla Eiriksdottir, the winner
of Best Gourmet Raw Chef and Best
Simple Raw Chef in the 2011 and
2012 “Best of Raw” Awards. Come and try out one
of her great dishes at her restaurant Gló.
Oliver Schneider was wearing a
green t-shirt with yellow print that
read: Just because you aren’t para-
noid doesn’t mean they aren’t after
you! I told him I might need a photo
of that and he laughed sharply. Oliver
is a young, computer-oriented guy
who came by the Grapevine office to
show us how to encrypt our emails.
Simply put: encryption is the pro-
cess of converting data into cipher-
text so that only someone with a key
that decrypts the data can view it.
You would send an encrypted email
so that no one along the way could
view or alter the content. We’re all a
little paranoid. Some of us more than
others, and all with good reason. It’s
actually not that complicated to carry
on being paranoid—encrypting your
emails is very simple, at least, the act
of doing it is straightforward, though
the actual science is not. There are
many methods for encryption, but
here’s a guide for one simple way to
encrypt your emails.
1. Oliver taught us how to encrypt
in Gmail, so here’s a disclaimer: if
you are using another email provider,
the steps may be different. First, go
to openpgpjs.org – “PGP stands for
Pretty Good Privacy,” Oliver said. I
couldn’t tell if that was real or a com-
puter-people joke, but confirmed: it’s
not a joke. OpenPGP is a website that
simplifies the process of encrypting.
You don’t have to download any-
thing, which is nice. Once you’re at
the website’s main page, pick from
the list of icons under “Downloads/
Plugins/Examples.” I chose Google
Chrome, since that was the browser
I was using. There are actually two
Google Chrome icons—I went with
the one on the left.
2. After you click the left Google
Chrome icon it takes you to a page
that says “Mymail-Crypt for Gmail,”
which has information about what
the hell you are doing and all that.
Click on the top right button that says
“ADD TO CHROME.” A little bar will
come down: click “tools,” then click
“extensions,” which should take you
to a page called “mymail-crypt for
Gmail options.”
3. Once you are at “mymail-crypt
for Gmail options,” click on a tab at
the top of the screen that says “my
keys.” There add your name, email
address, and passphrase. Empha-
sis on the term ‘passphrase,’ not
‘password’. You’re trying to protect
your information here, so it’s better
to go for something more complex.
Don’t use only letters. Get funky. For
the name box, type your name then
something specific about you, just
one word even, in parenthesis in
the same box. For example: “Ryan
Gosling (Feminist).” Do this because
there’s probably someone else in the
world that shares your name, and
there’s no reason to get mixed up
with anybody else. It’s also a good
idea to click on the “options” tab and
check the box that says “add myself
as an encrypted recipient on all mes-
sages. Allows decrypting sent mes-
sages.” This will add you as your own
friend under your “friend’s keys” tab
and allows you to go back and read
your sent emails without them being
encrypted.
4. Go back to the “my keys” tab
and have a look at your private key
by clicking “show key.” So, that key
you will obviously want to keep pri-
vate. Oliver stressed that it’s very im-
portant to protect your secret key (be
your own hero, you know), which is
why a complex passphrase is neces-
sary. If you then go to the “friends’
keys” tab, you’ll see your own key ID.
If you click “show key” on that page
you’ll see your public key. These keys
are what allow people to decrypt one
another’s encrypted emails. If Oliver
wants to send me an email, he has
to know my public key and I have to
know my private key, and vice versa.
If you know other people who have
encrypted Gmail accounts, ask for
their public key (which is a very long
page of numbers and letters), and
add them to your list of “friends’
key” by pasting their public key into
the text box.
5. Stay in Google Chrome and
your Gmail inbox—you’ll probably
see that at the bottom of every email
is a box for a password (you’ll al-
ways use the password you used
just moments ago to create a key for
yourself through Mymail-Crypt) and
three buttons: “Encrypt and Sign,”
“Encrypt,” and “Sign.” “Sign” refers
to your digital signature, which “is
like your handwriting on a postcard,”
Oliver said. It’s an indication that you
are who you say you are. It’s rather
nifty.
6. Now all you need is other peo-
ple who are into encryption as much
as you are. Exchanging encrypted
emails requires that people on both
ends of the email are involved in the
encryption and decryption process.
It’s not a one-man deal. If no one
else you communicate with sends
encrypted emails, then it’s pretty
useless. Many people upload their
public keys to public key servers
like pgp.mit.edu—where I uploaded
mine. That way if a friend wants to
find your public key, you can give
them your key ID and finger print (a
long list of numbers and letters that
make it even harder for your info to
get mixed up with someone else’s)
and they can find you on the server.
So that’s how it’s done. If you
have any further questions, consult
the Internet.
On a final note: what’s very inter-
esting about encryption is that while
it sounds mechanical and distant, it’s
actually very interpersonal and re-
quires people to be thoughtful about
exchanging information and working
together for the security of their data.
In a larger sense, the aim is to “create
a web of trust” between humans, as
Oliver put it. “If someone I know has
signed your key, then I have a certain
level of trust in that key. So if I get
something from you that is signed
by you I can have a certain level of
confidence that it is you.” Not every-
one trusts PGP, but there are a lot of
people who use it and a lot of people
who do.
Oliver thinks that the argument
of not protecting your information
because you have “nothing to hide,”
is a very weak one: “Someone says,
I have nothing to hide, okay, so you
can strip and I can take a photo of
you, and show that photo to your
neighbours and have all the rights to
that photo?”
Oliver also mentioned that people
have key signing parties where they
exchange information and in turn
strengthen the web of trust. I’m into
going down to the beach, building a
bonfire, and exchanging public keys
while we sing.
Keep Your Secrets
Secret
Grapevine’s nifty guide
to encrypting your emails
By: Shea Sweeney