Re: gpg4win expired code signing cert; please renew.

**This post is on the thread’s topic about the gpg4win expired cert.**

On Wed, 15 Oct 2025 20:00:25 -0500, Jay Acuna <[email protected]> wrote:

>[...]
>The certificate is not invalid. It has a validity period for signatures 
>made by it notAfter July 2, 2025. The key word is new signatures made 
>by it.  The signing date of May 21, 2025 is within the validity period, 
>so the certificate is valid and good.
>[...]

Thanks for the explanation.  I understand that Microsoft Authenticode 
uses digitally-signed timestamping.  However, per my OP, the problem is 
a real-world, in-the-wild report by a new user (not me!) with a 
Microsoft platform (not me!!).  The user got a certificate validation 
error on:

Signed file: gpg4win-5.0.0-beta369.exe
Date: **2025-09-05**

That file has a detached PGP .sig by Werner Koch.  It cannot be verified 
by someone who does not yet have a known-good (Libre|Open)PGP 
implementation already installed.  To solve this chicken-and-egg 
problem...

[Quotes re-arranged for clarity.]
>I don't suggest x509 PKI as the way to authenticate software, [...]

...the x509 PKI provides bootstrap authentication for a first-time 
gpg4win user.  IIUC, it is *entirely* the reason why the gpg4win project 
deals with Microsoft-blessed PKI bureaucracy to distribute the software 
that almost the whole FOSS world (except some BSD) uses for digital 
signatures on package distribution.

In the 1990ies, I faced the same bootstrap problem with getting my first 
PGP.  For that first PGP, I bought NAI PGP on CD-ROM off the shelf in a 
brick-and-mortar store—at least to help somewhat mitigate any risk of 
targeted attacks.  x509 PKI is easier, and much more secure. :-)

Always,

[email protected]

-- 
A makeshift way to distribute my current PQ-PGP key:
https://lists.gnupg.org/pipermail/gnupg-users/attachments/20250107/4732a382/attachment.key
01A6D81EEAD7EEEC393DEC1401F4894C154E1B8EE32E9059CA5566792A836823

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