PGP and GPG: Email for the Practical Paranoid at Dominant Systems Book Store

"An excellent book that shows . . . just about everything [you] need to know to effectively and properly use PGP and OpenPGP." -- Slashdot, June 26, 2006

"Buy and read this book to gain a better understanding of how to protect and secure . . . messages from unauthorized viewing." -- About.com, June 12, 2006

Customer Reviews & Comments
This really is a terrific book if you're at all interested in learning how to secure information. It's very well-written in a clear, *concise* manner. Two great introductory chapters lay out the fundamentals of cryptography and OpenPGP in plain English. There's nice coverage on terminology, the differences between OpenPGP/PGP/GPG, and the basics of using them. The first chapter has also got a terrific chart laying out specific actions for things you want to do with your messages, like "I want to send a message that only my intended recipient can read" which is answered by "Encrypt the message with the recipient's public key." Much of the rest of the book follows this same clear vein as the author moves through the details of implementing PGP/GPG. The book is full of small tidbits of very useful information, such as considerations for selecting expiration periods for your keys, or how to decide on what levels of trust to give family and friends, or even how to increase your paranoia by worrying about whether or not a hardware keystroke probe is monitoring your passphrase as you enter it. The sections covering implementation of GPG are particularly well done. GPG isn't the easiest thing to work with, but Lucas does a great job of pointing out potential pitfalls and working readers past the rough spots. A terrific work that lays out lots of good information in a small, well-written package.

Back To Top