In <[EMAIL PROTECTED]">mid:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
Simon [S] wrote:'
S> A 629 byte email signed with my S/MIME certificate weighs in at
S> 3,634 bytes. That's only a difference of about 3k, and not the 6k
S> you claim to start.
The size difference depends on the key size doesn't it?
The difference in message size by over 500%.
S> Of course the same 629 byte file PGP clear-signed weighs in at
S> only 993 bytes, which seems to be a very small addition in
S> comparison.
Yes. An increase in message size of about 50%.
S> *However*, if I then add my PGP key block to the mail as well,
S> which is the true comparison that needs to be made, the 629 byte
S> email suddenly weighs in at 3,591 bytes.
That wouldn't be a true comparison since PGP key blocks are *not*
sent with a PGP signature by default. This is not the case with
S/MIME. Can you suppress sending your public key block repeatedly
and with every message you send using S/MIME? In fact, this is my
main problem with using it.
S> So the real differences in size overhead are not that great at
S> all. The mechanism for delivery may be differ - the overall bytes
S> split and delivered in two separate parts - but the size
S> difference isn't significant at all, and of course S/MIME will
S> have an advantage in many respects as the email carries the
S> certificate, unlike PGP, and can be immediately imported without
S> any further requests.
After importing it, I don't need you sending it anymore. With PGP
you can check the signature. If you don't have the key, then it's
auto-retrieved or you can obtain it as desired. Only once.
Consider this:
You sent an entire message amounting to 650 kbytes.
This means that you can send a decently large message that is within
3kbytes in size. Think of the cummulative bandwidth consumption if
everyone were to start using S/MIME as you do, i.e., sending the
3kbyte key block with each and every S/MIME signed message which is
every message?
Say that there are 500 subscribers to this list? Your 650byte
message would amount to 312kbytes of bandwidth. If you send the same
message S/MIME signed ... 3.6kbytes X500 ... 1.8MB! Look at it in a
cummulative sense and you see that it's not really insignificant.
The same problem applies to sending HTML mail with a plain text
version everytime you send mail.
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-=] Allie C Martin [=- {List Moderator}
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