In this section: About Digital Signatures & Encryption Getting Other People's Certificates |
When you compose a mail or newsgroup message, you can choose to attach your digital signature to the message. A digital signature allows recipients of the message to verify that the message really comes from you and hasn't been tampered with since you sent it.
When you compose a mail message, you can also choose to encrypt the message. Encryption makes it nearly impossible for anyone other than the intended recipient to read the message while it is in transit over the Internet.
Encryption is not available for newsgroup messages.
Before you can sign or encrypt a message, you must take these preliminary steps:
Once you have completed these steps, follow the directions in these sections to sign and encrypt messages:
The following sections provide a brief overview of how digital signatures and encryption work. For more technical details on this subject, see the online document Introduction to Public-Key Cryptography.
A digital signature is a special code, unique to each message, created by means of public-key cryptography.
A digital signature is completely different from a handwritten signature, although it can sometimes be used for similar legal purposes, such as signing a contract.
To create a digital signature for an email or newsgroup message that you are sending, you need two things:
Your certificate is a bit like your name and phone number in the phonebookit is public information that helps other people communicate with you.
Your private key is protected by your master password and is not normally disclosed to anyone else. The Mail & Newsgroup software uses your private key to create a unique, verifiable digital signature for every message you choose to sign.
To encrypt an email message, you must have an encryption certificate for each of the message's recipients. The public key in each certificate is used to encrypt the message for that recipient.
If you dont have a certificate for even a single recipient, the message cannot be encrypted.
The recipient's software uses the recipient's private key, which remains on that person's computer, to decrypt the message.
Every time you send a digitally signed message, your encryption certificate is automatically included with the message. Therefore, one of the easiest ways to obtain someone else's certificate is for that person to send you a digitally signed message.
When you receive such a message, the person's certificate is automatically stored by the Certificate Manager, which is the part of the browser that keeps track of certificates.
You can also obtain certificates by looking them up in a public directory, such as the "phonebook"directories maintained by many companies.
Text for these sections to come.
This section describes the Message Security window that you can open for any message you are composing. If you're not already viewing Message Security, click the Security icon in the toolbar of the Compose window.
The Message Security window describes how your message will be sent:
The Message Security window also lists the certifiates available for the recipients of your message:
For information more information about obtaining certificates and configuring message security settings, see Signing & Encrypting Messages
To indicate your signing or encryption choices for an individual message, click the arrow beside the Security button in the Compose window, then select the options you want.
This section describes the Message Security window that you can open for any message you have received. If you're not already viewing Message Security for a received message, follow these steps:
The Message Security window displays the following information:
If validation failed while OCSP was enabled, check the OCSP settings in Privacy & Security Preferences - Validation. If you are not familiar with OCSP, confirm the settings with your system administrator. If your settings are correct, there may be a problem with the OCSP service or the certificate used to create the signature is no longer valid. If the signature is invalid because of a problem with a certificate's trust settings, you can use the Certificate Manager to view or edit those settings.
For information more information about obtaining certificates and configuring message security settings, see Signing & Encrypting Messages.
To indicate your signing or encryption choices for an individual message, click the arrow beside the Security button in the Compose window, then select the options you want.
19 March 2002 Copyright © 1994-2002 Netscape Communications Corporation.Message Security - Received Message