Secure email

[whisper]

I need to write a .cgi that will take the content of an https GET or
POST and send it securely as email to an Outlook client.

I think that OpenSSL is somewhere in this, but I'm not even sure how to
create the right certificate, how to use it to encrypt mail and how to
install a certificate in Outlook (>= 2000).

Code snippets and pointers to tutorials greatly appreciated. I've got a
week to deploy this!

Thanks!

Dave LeBlanc
Seattle, WA USA

 

[Paul Rubin]

I need to write a .cgi that will take the content of an https GET or
POST and send it securely as email to an Outlook client.

You're asking how to make S/MIME messages? This isn't really the
right newsgroup.

 

[whisper]

(e-mail address removed) writes:



You're asking how to make S/MIME messages? This isn't really the
right newsgroup.

Well, perhaps it bears saying explicitly that I want to use python and
python libraries to write the .cgi script.

If there's a better newsgroup, would you please tell me?

Dave LeBlanc
Seattle, WA USA

 

[Martin P. Hellwig]

I need to write a .cgi that will take the content of an https GET or
POST and send it securely as email to an Outlook client.

I think that OpenSSL is somewhere in this, but I'm not even sure how to
create the right certificate, how to use it to encrypt mail and how to
install a certificate in Outlook (>= 2000).

Code snippets and pointers to tutorials greatly appreciated. I've got a
week to deploy this!

I think you want this more common approach for mail encryption:

server:
https CGI form --> mail wrapper --> PGP encryption/signing --> send

client:
recieve mail --> pgp decryption/verification --> read

All parts are trivial except for pgp but you could get more information
at http://www.openpgp.org/

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Michael_Str=F6der?=]

I need to write a .cgi that will take the content of an https GET or
POST and send it securely as email to an Outlook client.

I think that OpenSSL is somewhere in this, but I'm not even sure how to
create the right certificate, how to use it to encrypt mail and how to
install a certificate in Outlook (>= 2000).

M2Crypto which wraps OpenSSL libs could be an option for sending S/MIME
e-mails:

http://sandbox.rulemaker.net/ngps/m2/

Ciao, Michael.

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Michael_Str=F6der?=]

I think you want this more common approach for mail encryption:

server:
https CGI form --> mail wrapper --> PGP encryption/signing --> send

client:
recieve mail --> pgp decryption/verification --> read

This would require an additional PGP-plugin for Outlook. Outlook can
decrypt S/MIME messages out-of-the-box.

Ciao, Michael.

 

[Martin P. Hellwig]

This would require an additional PGP-plugin for Outlook. Outlook can
decrypt S/MIME messages out-of-the-box.

Ciao, Michael.

Yes indeed, although I personaly find pgp a bit more elegant your
solution would be the best for the OP.

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Michael_Str=F6der?=]

Yes indeed, although I personaly find pgp a bit more elegant your
solution would be the best for the OP.

Whether S/MIME or PGP is used depends very much on the security policy
the application has to comply with and the rest of the system
environment we both know very little about. Therefore I can't see what's
more "elegant" with PGP in general and how you can tell what the "best
solution" is for the original poster.

Ciao, Michael.

 

[Martin P. Hellwig]

Michael Ströder wrote:

Whether S/MIME or PGP is used depends very much on the security policy
the application has to comply with and the rest of the system
environment we both know very little about. Therefore I can't see what's
more "elegant" with PGP in general and how you can tell what the "best
solution" is for the original poster.

<cut>
Not general, personal in the sence of my own opinion just like I have it
wrote it.
Best for the OP because as you pointed out there was a written (although
older) howto for s/mime which the OP could follow (as he requested),
howto's for PGP icw Python is a bit rare, although I haven't googled for
long.