Re: s/mime

From: Carsten Buchenau (c.buchenau@netunion.com)
Date: 07/23/01 

Message-ID: <013a01c11392$19315160$313eebc2@GIZMO>
From: "Carsten Buchenau" <c.buchenau@netunion.com>
To: <security-basics@securityfocus.com>
Subject: Re: s/mime
Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2001 18:11:15 +0200

> Greetz.
>
> I am currently learning about s/mime and would like to find out about what
> it is and where it fits into the whole secure e-mailing arena. google just
> return cryptic docs that I cannont understand. I am a layman and would like
> a more understandable document that will inform me.

It's a system for encrypting text in e-mails based on Public Key Encryption - like PGP. The main difference: S/MIME requires Certificates issued and signed by a trusted 3rd Party (Verisign, Thawte, D-Trust, ...).

S/MIME stands for "Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions". MIME Headers enable mail-Clients to automatically recognize the Context-type of an e-mail and how to decode it.

You might want to try these links:

Oxford University, Introduction to Security Issues in Email,
http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/email/secure/

ZDNet-Article: Secure E-Mail,
http://www.zdnet.com/pcmag/features/smime/_open.htm

Slides from Dave Crocker, Uni Brandenburg, DE, about IETF Standards, includes a (very) brief comparison between PGP and S/MIME.
http://www.brandenburg.com/presentations/MIME-stds/

If this is all too high, try this course by Gershon Kedem, Duke University. The Lecture Notes (PDFs) are slides you might find useful for a self-study....
http://kedem.cs.duke.edu/cps296/index.html

Good Luck

Relevant Pages

  • RE: s/mime
    ... >>> return cryptic docs that I cannont understand. ... >> Oxford University, Introduction to Security Issues in Email, ... includes a brief comparison between PGP and S/MIME. ... The Lecture Notes are slides you might find ...
    (Security-Basics)
  • s/mime
    ... I am currently learning about s/mime and would like to find out about what ... it is and where it fits into the whole secure e-mailing arena. ...
    (Security-Basics)