Peter van der Linden's Guide to Linux: A Lesson in Encryption, Part 3 (Linux Journal)
People often sign files or e-mail that they encrypt. That way, only the intended recipient can read it, and the recipient knows that you are definitely the person who sent it, too. Computerized signatures based on encryption are far more reliable than written signatures that are forged on a daily basis by people with criminal intent. But computerized signatures are only as good as the encryption scheme and key length you use. For GPG, that's a pretty good assurance, until you start to look at all the interfaces outside GPG that can be subverted."
