Mac Encryption - PGP/GPG

Earlier last month I installed the PGP Desktop for Mac 9.x from PGP Corporation but ran into a problem with it, for some weird reason, affecting my Safari and Firefox connection to our internal firewall web based administration tool. I called PGP about the problem, but they don't provide support for products that haven't been purchased (yes, no pre-sales support). I posted in their forum to see if I could get an answer, but nothing, so I was left with no choice but to un-install their software. Still wanting to have some type of encryption I could use on my Mac to deal with our files I took a look at GPG. I use GPG with some of my server processes, but never really looked at the Mac version. Turns out there are some nice GUI utilities to make it a little easier to work with then just the command-line (not that I mind the command-line). I did the following for my setup (it might sound difficult, but it really isn't!):

1. Download the Mac GNU Privacy Guard package (this is the actual GPG software) and install the software.
2. Download the GPG Keychain Access tool and install.

3. Open the GPG Keychain Access tool. Now Import a previous private key (if you had one before like I did), or click on the button to Generate a key
4. Import any additional private or public keys you might have using the GPG Keychain Access tool
5. If you imported any keys, you now need to "trust" them. To do this, select the key in the list, now click on the Key menu and select "Edit". Now type "trust" and set the level of trust you have for that persons key.
6. With the same key selected, go to the "Key" menu again and sign the key.
7. Download the GPGFileTool, then drag it into your Applications folder
8. Download the GPGPreferences, then drag it into your Applications folder
9. Open the System Preferences, open GnuPG
10. Click on the Key Server tab, check "Automatically retrieve keys...", check "Include Disabled" and "Include Revoked"
11. Click on the Compatibility tab, I selected PGP 7
12. Now if you launch the GPGFileTool, you can drag a file onto the Dock icon and it will allow you encrypt/sign or decrypt/sign the file.
13. Last, if you want to use encrypted or signed email you can use the GPGMail plug-in, which works for me in Leopard, to do this.

Next you'll want to create a public key of your keypair so you can give it to another person. They will need this to sign/encrypt a message/file for you. To do this:

1. Open GPG Keychain Access
2. Click on the Public tab
3. Select your public key
4. Click on the Export button at the top
5. Be sure to check the "ASCII armored" checkbox, provide a filename and save the file
6. Provide this public key to anyone so they can sign/encrypt a message/file just for you