announce.txt -- RIPEM Beta test announcement.
Mark Riordan  mrr@scss3.cl.msu.edu   4 October 1992

Dear RIPEM beta-tester:

RIPEM, an RSA/DES encryption program, is now being beta tested.
You are invited to participate.

RIPEM is a public-key encryption program oriented toward use with
electronic mail.  It provides capabilities very similar to
Privacy-Enhanced Mail (PEM), as described by Internet RFC's 1113-1115.
However, RIPEM lacks the concept of a "certificate", a document
which guarantees that you have the correct public key of a
correspondant.  RIPEM does implement a simple public key server,
but this is much less secure than the certificate-based key management
described in those RFC's.

To give you a taste of what RIPEM is like, I present an abbreviated
description of its calling sequence:

Usage:  ripem {-e | -d | -g}     <in >out
  [-r recipient] [-m {encrypted | mic-only | mic-clear}]
  [-u myusername]  [-h head] [-b #_of_bits_in_gen_key]
  [-p publickey_infile] [-s privatekey_infile] [-k key_to_private_key]
  [-P publickey_outfile] [-S privatekey_outfile]
  [-y pub_key_server_name] [-Y key_sources]
  [-i infile] [-o outfile] [-D debug_level] [-Z debug_out_file]          
  [-R random_sources] [-F random_input_file] [-C random_string]         
where:
  random_sources is one or more of "cefks", specifying "random" input from
    Command line, Entire command line, File, Keyboard, or running System.
  key_sources is a string of one or more of "fgs", which tell ripem to look
    for public keys from a File, finGer, or Server, in the order specified.
  head is one or more of "ipr", for Include headers in msg; Prepend headers
    to ciphertext; get Recipients from headers.  For encryption only.
Relevant environment variables:
  RIPEM_PUBLIC_KEY_FILE, RIPEM_PRIVATE_KEY_FILE, RIPEM_KEY_TO_PRIVATE_KEY,
  RIPEM_USER_NAME, RIPEM_RANDOM_FILE, RIPEM_SERVER_NAME, RIPEM_ARGS

RIPEM works on various Unix machines, on MS-DOS, and on the Macintosh
(console emulation only).  You may wish to help me port it to other platforms.

I have set up a primitive key server that allows RIPEM users to
exchange public keys.

RIPEM itself is in the public domain, but it uses RSA Data Security's
RSAREF cryptographic toolkit.  RSAREF is free to US and Canadian
users, but only for personal use.  RSAREF, and hence RIPEM, requires
that you agree to a license agreement.  A copy of this agreement is
included in the RIPEM distribution--and you should read it.

To obtain the beta-test copy of RIPEM, FTP to rpub.cl.msu.edu
and look in the directory pub/ripem.  Both source and executables
can be found there.  The FTP server is picky about who it lets in;
if you have problems, send email to ripem-request@rpub.cl.msu.edu.

The current version of RIPEM is in beta test, and may not be 
suitable for general release.  (That's what the beta test is
supposed to find out.)  Therefore, I ask that you not redistribute
this version without my permission.

Furthermore, RIPEM may fall under US Government export controls, so I 
ask that you refrain from distributing this or any version outside of 
USA and Canada, and from giving RIPEM to "foreign nationals".

Mark Riordan  mrr@scss3.cl.msu.edu