[43654] in Cypherpunks
Re: Design proposal: crypto-capable generic interface
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Raph Levien)
Sun Nov 19 20:38:44 1995
Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 17:27:39 -0800 (PST)
From: Raph Levien <raph@c2.org>
To: Derek Atkins <warlord@MIT.EDU>
Cc: cypherpunks@toad.com, s1113645@tesla.cc.uottawa.ca
In-Reply-To: <199511192347.PAA07661@tess-turbo.mit.edu>
On Sun, 19 Nov 1995, Derek Atkins wrote:
> What do you mean by "technically superior"? What technical merits
> does MOSS have over PGP? It does have a better protocol with which to
> integrate it into mailers, but it is only a transmission protocol, not
> a security mechanism change. Worse, MOSS uses X.509, which requires a
> lot of overhead for certificates.
Ah, I was hoping that my statement would stir some controversy. I've
learned that well thought out, carefully reasoned posts never get any
response.
I agree with you that the X.509 stuff is extra baggage in MOSS.
Fortunately, the use of X.509 is optional.
MOSS has two very large advantages over PGP:
1. It can operate without temp files.
2. It has no non-MIME variant.
It will take forever for PGP/MIME to catch on. Thus, PGP will never
really be a suitable candidate for my generic interface. Ah well.
> On the other hand, the MIME-PGP protocol can provide the same
> integration functionality as MOSS and still allow the use of the
> simple PGP certification structure that already exists.
This is true. I hope it happens.
> -derek
>
Raph
