Using Keys -- Encrypting Data

• Now bob is going to send me an encrypted file, hello.txt

  	[bob@yohost bob]$ cat hello.txt
  	hello!
  
  	how is the weather?
  
  	it is freaking cold here.
  	

• bob uses the --encrypt option to encrypt the file:

  	[bob@yohost bob]$ gpg --encrypt hello.txt
  	You did not specify a user ID. (you may use "-r")
  
  	Enter the user ID: mandi@linuxchick.org
  	Could not find a valid trust path to the key.  Let's see whether we
  	can assign some missing owner trust values.
  
  	No path leading to one of our keys found.
  
  	1024g/E0524E3E 2002-10-04 "Mandi Walls "
  	             Fingerprint: C1A2 F26B 5714 4DC8 CD2A  1DAC F25E D76D E052 4E3E
  
  	It is NOT certain that the key belongs to its owner.
  	If you *really* know what you are doing, you may answer
  	the next question with yes
  
  	Use this key anyway? yes
  	

• bob now has a file in his directory, called hello.txt.gpg which he can send to me and i can decrypt
• This file is not stored in ASCII format by default; it is binary. To encrypt into ASCII, use gpg --encrypt -a hello.txt, which will create a file called hello.txt.asc

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http://www.linuxchick.org/gpg