Add sign key only?

Chris Poole lists at chrispoole.com
Sat Dec 11 17:36:46 CET 2010


I have been using gpg for a while now, with just one subkey for signing and
encryption.

I decided I wanted a separate key for signing, so if I have to give away my
private key for decrypting documents, they can't use it to impersonate me too.

Listing my keys was like this:

    pub  1024D/BAD246F9  created: 2006-03-31  expires: never       usage: SC
    sub  4096g/E71D7B3E  created: 2006-03-31  expires: never       usage: E

So I ran `gpg --edit-key BAD246F9`, and `addkey`. I chose DSA (sign only)
2048-bit. My keychain looks like this now:

    pub  1024D/BAD246F9  created: 2006-03-31  expires: never       usage: SC
    sub  4096g/E71D7B3E  created: 2006-03-31  expires: never       usage: E
    sub  2048D/7ED39759  created: 2010-12-11  expires: never       usage: S

It seems like I've done the right thing: I have a key for encryption, and one
for signing. It seems like my main public key is also allowed for signing too:
is this right?

Also, since I have two subkeys for encryption and signing, both use the same
passphrase, so I don't see how it'll stop anyone who gets my encryption key
being able to sign documents as me too.

Have I done it right?

(Also, my public key has now changed, which I guess is to be expected.)



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