Lee, you are so enlightening. I keep all your mail in a special mailbox under tchnology>MacUser>tips, so that I can refer to them whenever there is a need. Thanks so much. Marta On Jul 7, 2004, at 14:27, Lee Larson wrote:
> On Jul 7, 2004, at 12:42 PM, Marta Edie wrote: > >> For some reason, i have never been a security nut. I always think >> whoever wants to find out about my secret doings, will find out >> anyway, and those things I already did, the so-called "diddings" the >> secret seekers already know, and since I am close to disappearing >> from this earth, it does not much matter either way. > > Apple is not catering to just the security nuts by including the > "Secure empty trash" option. Many government agencies and some > companies require this feature when they purchase computers. > > Although I'm still planning to kill Bill for posting yet another > signed message, I do think being able to sign messages is a good > thing. The digital signature gives some assurance that the message is > coming from Bill, and not somebody masquerading as Bill. Some > companies and government agencies require messages to be signed and > perhaps even strongly encrypted. > > Two of the biggest roadblocks in the way of more convenient Internet > usage by everyone are privacy and assured identity. For example, even > though it would likely be faster and more convenient, many medical > providers refuse to answer personal questions by e-mail because they > don't really know to whom they are sending private information. > Digital signatures are a solution for this problem. (They'd likely > want to use strong encryption too. Strong encryption and digital > signatures are two sides of the same coin.) > > Right now, the encryption establishment is in the hands of a few > companies, and they're more interested in selling keys to Internet > commerce sites, banks and investment firms than pushing secure e-mail. > Because of this, a new user has to navigate difficult Web pages and > establish "levels of trust" in order to get reliable and useful keys. > > The government should get into the act and make it easy to establish a > digital identity. (Post office? County clerk's office?) But, the > government discourages the use of strong encryption because the FBI, > NSA, CIA, etc. lobby against it. They claim encryption will make it > harder to catch Osama, if they can't read Osama's e-mail. Of course, > Osama already uses strong encryption. They're just making it less > convenient for the rest of us. > > PS/ On my list of things to do is to determine why the scripts that > run this list are allergic to signed messages. > > PPS/ Jerry, it's the mangler script that hangs, in case you've got the > time to peek at it before it floats to the top of my things to do > queue. > > > > | The next meeting of the Louisville Computer Society will > | be July 27. The LCS Web page is <http://www.kymac.org>. > | List posting address: <mailto:macgroup at erdos.math.louisville.edu> > | List Web page: <http://erdos.math.louisville.edu/macgroup> > | The next meeting of the Louisville Computer Society will | be July 27. The LCS Web page is <http://www.kymac.org>. | List posting address: <mailto:macgroup at erdos.math.louisville.edu> | List Web page: <http://erdos.math.louisville.edu/macgroup>
