Signing key

Purpose

This key only has the capability to sign and certify: it has no encryption subkey.

Its only purpose is:

To certify other cryptographic public keys needed for Tails development

Policy

Is not owned in a usable format by any single individual. It is split cryptographically using [gfshare](https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libgfshare).

Is only used offline, in an air-gapped Tails only communicating with the outside world through:

Plugging the Tails flash media in another operating system to install Tails in the first place.

Plugging other removable media in the air-gapped Tails to send the public key, secret key stubs, parts of the secret master key, and so on to the outside world.

Plugging other removable media in the air-gapped Tails to receive Debian packages, public keys, and so on from the outside world.

Expires in less than one year. We will extend its validity as many times as we find reasonable.

Has a revocation certificate split amongst different people. See the [[details of the mechanism|signing_key_revocation]].

Signing subkeys

Stored on OpenPGP smartcards owned by those who need them. Smartcards ensure that the cryptographic operations are done on the smartcard itself and that the secret cryptographic material is not directly available to the operating system using it.

Key details

How to get the public key?

To get this OpenPGP public key, download it from this website: [[!tails_website tails-signing.key]].

If you already have Tails signing key but download it again, it can update the list of existing signatures of the key.

User support key