{kernel,debian}.org KSP for the NYC area: October 19, 2011

hey folks--

what say y'all to meeting up for a social hour or three at Pacific Standard this coming Wednesday evening at 7pm? [email protected] will be in town, and possibly some other free software folks will come too.

This might be an opportunity for linux kernel folks to meet up and sign keys too, so bring keysigning info if you want to participate in that kind of interaction.

Looking forward to seeing everyone,

	--dkg

I will be holding a key signing party in Cambridge on Tuesday, October 18, from 4-5pm for folks in the Boston greater metropolitan area.

Anyone who is interested should send me their key-id by Tuesday noon US/Eastern, and I will give those folks the details about where we will
be holding the key signing party. Please put "BOSTON KEY SIGNING" in
the subject line.

Please feel free to forward this to any fellow kernel devs who might not be reading LKML.

- Ted

What's a key-signing party?

A key-signing party is a get-together with PGP users for the purpose of meeting other PGP users and signing each other's keys. This helps to extend the "web of trust" to a great degree. Also, it sometimes serves as a forum to discuss strong cryptography and related issues.

What do I need for this party?

Required Items
Physical attendance
Positive picture ID
Your Key ID, Key type, HEX fingerprint, and Key size A pen/pencil or whatever you'd like to write with.... NO computer

Required Process

1. All attendees send their public keys to a public keyserver. For this party, we'll use keyserver.cryptnet.net. If for some reason you don't want your key to be in a public keyserver, but still want to participate, please let me know.

2. All attendees send their key ID, key type, fingerprint, and key size to the host, [email protected], who will compile everyone's key information.

3. The host prints a list with everyone's key ID, key type, fingerprint, and key size from the compiled keyrings and distributes copies of the printout at the meeting.

4. Attend the party. Bring along a paper copy of your key ID, key type, fingerprint, and key size that you obtained from your own keyring. You must also bring along a suitable photo ID. Instruct the attendees at the beginning that they are to make two marks on the listing, one for correct key information (key ID, key type, fingerprint, and key size) and one if the ID check is ok.

5. At the meeting each key owner reads his key ID, key type, fingerprint, key size, and user ID from his own printout, not from the distributed listing. This is because there could be an error, intended or not, on the listing. This is also the time to tell which ID's to sign or not. If the key information matches your printout then place a check-mark by the key.

6. After everyone has read his key ID information, have all attendees form a line.

7. The first person walks down the line having every person check his
ID. The second person follows immediately behind the first person and
so on.

8. If you are satisfied that the person is who they say they are, and that the key on the printout is theirs, you place another check-mark next to their key on your printout.

9. Once the first person cycles back around to the front of the line he has checked all the other IDs and his ID has been checked by all others.

10. After confirming that the key information on the key server matches the printout that you have checked, sign the appropriate keys. Keys should only be signed if they have two check-marks. If you are using Debian or Ubuntu, the "caff" (certifying authority fire and forget) script can be found in the "signing-party" package along with other useful scripts, which makes it much easier to sign the keys. For Fedora, the "caff" script can be found in the "pgp-tools" package.

11. Send the signed keys back to the keyservers, or to owners of the key.

Other questions about signing keys?

You may want to read the Keysigning Party Howto which includes an explanation of the concepts behind keysigning, instructions for hosting a keysigning party, instructions for participating in a keysinging party, and step by step instructions for signing other's keys.

On Thursday October 19, 2011 at Pacific Standard [1] from 19:00 to 20:00, I and Daniel will hold a KSP.