GPG Mail
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. (January 2017) |
 | |
| Original author(s) | GPGTools |
|---|---|
| Stable release | 3.0.1 (part of GPG Suite 2018.5)
/ October 23, 2018[1] |
| Operating system | macOS |
| Type | Cryptography |
| License | GPLv2 |
| Website | gpgtools |
GPGMail is an extension for Apple Mail that provides public key email encryption and signing. GPGMail works under macOS and the actual cryptographic functionality is handled by GNU Privacy Guard.[2]
GPGMail was first released on February 7, 2001, by Stéphane Corthésy, and since 2010 is maintained by GPGTools. GNU Privacy Guard is free open-source software, but use of GPGMail now requires purchase of a support plan.[3]
On September 21, 2018, the developer introduced GPGMail 3.0 as a part of GPG Suite 2018.4, a new software release that included support for macOS Mojave. In this release, the developer removed the free license option for GPGMail. A lot of users that relied on automated upgrades were caught by surprise, which prompted a significant backlash from the community. While the licensing change was identified in the release notes for GPG Suite 2018.4, many believed that such a big change required a more prominent notification to avoid the perception of "bait and switch".[4]
See also
- Email encryption
- OpenPGP standard for encrypting and decrypting data
References
- ^ "GPG Suite Release Notes". Retrieved November 9, 2018.
- ^ http://www.sente.ch/software/GPGMail/English.lproj/GPGMail.html
- ^ https://gpgtools.org/
- ^ Ilascu, Ionut (September 25, 2018). "GPG Mail Update Surprises Mac Users with Paid Plan". Bleeping Computer.