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Discussion => Security => Topic started by: TravellingWithoutMoving on December 16, 2011, 06:41 pm

Title: GnuPG versus pgp versus OpenPGP
Post by: TravellingWithoutMoving on December 16, 2011, 06:41 pm
- this is a quick type up of gpg, pgp, openpgp and how they differ, i'll edit it as needed, no need to comment / post replies ..pm pls ..
  otherwise the thread will just span pages and pages like the infamous missing gummy star thread...


The terms "OpenPGP", "PGP", and "GnuPG / GPG" are often used interchangeably. This is a common mistake, since they are distinctly different.

    OpenPGP is technically a proposed standard, although it is widely used. OpenPGP is not a program, and shouldn't be referred to as such.
        PGP and GnuPG are computer programs that implement the OpenPGP standard.

    PGP is an acronym for Pretty Good Privacy, a computer program which provides cryptographic privacy and authentication.

    GnuPG is an acronym for Gnu Privacy Guard, another computer program which provides cryptographic privacy and authentication. For further information on GnuPG.




GPG DESCRIPTION
       gpg2 is the OpenPGP part of the GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG). It is a tool
       to provide digital encryption and signing services  using  the  OpenPGP
       standard. gpg2 features complete key management and all bells and whis-
       tles you can expect from a decent OpenPGP implementation.
In contrast to the standalone version gpg, which  is  more  suited  for
       server and embedded platforms, this version is installed under the name
       gpg2 and more targeted to the desktop as it requires several other mod-
       ules  to  be installed.


GPG INTEROPERABILITY
       GnuPG tries to be a very flexible implementation of the  OpenPGP  stan-
       dard. In particular, GnuPG implements many of the optional parts of the
       standard, such as the SHA-512 hash, and the ZLIB and BZIP2  compression
       algorithms.  It  is important to be aware that not all OpenPGP programs
       implement these optional algorithms..


official home of GnuPG:
http://www.gnupg.org/

official home of Gnu;
https://www.gnu.org

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