Many of you have installed PGP based on my recent series of articles. As promised, here is a simple way to use PGP to make your day-to-day life easier. Specifically, you can use the program to encrypt the username and passwords to various services on the Internet that you use.
I realize that Internet Explorer will save your passwords for you but there are a couple of problems with that. First, anyone using your computer can access any private sites you visit--bank accounts, credit card sites, private information sites, etc. In addition do you really want to trust your private data to a Microsoft product? I sure don't.
Instead store your information inside a simple text file that you keep PGP encrypted. This file can be right on your desktop. Unless the other person knows your private passphrase they aren't going to see your data. Another advantage to this approach is that you can keep notes along with your data. For example I might make a note of which sections of a private site are most useful to me. Then I'm not spending my time searching for that spot I saw during my last visit.
If you want to try this approach it's easy (I'll assume you already have PGP installed on your system):
Create a new file in your favorite text editor that will become your private password file; Notepad works fine for this.
Type all the information you want to store in your private password file.
Save the file to your desktop with a name like "mystuff.txt".
With the file open click the PGP icon in your tray (looks like a small padlock).
Choose "Current Window / Encrypt" from the menu.
Pick your PGP Key from the list that pops up.
Click OK.
Your document should now be incomprehensible to anyone looking at it, even you! So how do you look at it? With the document open click the PGP tray icon. Choose "Current Window / Decrypt and Verify". Enter your private passphrase in the window that pops up. Your secret data will now be visible to you. Just close the file when you are done and it's encrypted again. Quick and easy.
This little technique lets you hide your secret data in plain sight. You needn't worry about someone discovering your passwords because without your private passphrase it's virtually impossible for anyone to access that data, including you! So make sure you remember your passphrase.
Simple as that. I've put a page up that explains this process
with a few pictures. Find it here:
http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/421/tr.cgi?dan1
You can reach Dan Butler at:
mailto:danbutler@TheNakedPC.com
