How Do I Do This PGP/GPG Thing?

[Bill Davidsen]

Jerry Feldman wrote:
> On 01/17/2009 12:40 PM, Bruno Wolff III wrote:
>> On Sat, Jan 17, 2009 at 12:04:47 -0500,
>>   "Michael H. Warfield" <mhw at WittsEnd.com> wrote:
>>  
>>> Eventually, even these were forced to be relaxed for open source
>>> software to the point where they have almost no real impact.  If you
>>>     
>>
>> I think again this was done to make a free speech argument challenging
>> the regulations moot so that they could still harrass companies when 
>> needed.
>>
>> One other note is that the original version of PGP used the IDEA 
>> encryption
>> algorithm. This algorithm is covered by a patent for a couple of years 
>> yet.
>> So the supplied version of gpg in many distros is not going to be able to
>> handle stuff ecnrypted with the original gpg and some old keys. This 
>> probably
>> won't be a problem for you.
>>
>>   
> To make a long story short, some of the technology behind public key 
> encryption is based on a patent owned by MIT and leased to RSA. The 
> technology was developed by Ronald Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard 
> Adleman who were at MIT at the time although public key encryption was 
> originally proposed at Stanford. There was a big battle waged between 
> RSA and Phil Zimmerman, and during that time, MIT was able to open 
> source some of the technology. I'm being very general, because that was 
> the subject of last December's Boston Linux and Unix meeting which we 
> hold at MIT each month.
> 
AFAIK the patent expired last year...

-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen at tmr.com>
   "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from
the machinations of the wicked."  - from Slashdot