All this talk about signing has spurred me to set it up on my email. I am having a problem however. I am using gpg (GnuPG) 1.0.6. As instructed by the KMail help file, I am running the command "gpg --gen-key" on the command line to create my keys. I have gone down through the list of questions until it asks for my "Real name" Here is what happened: You need a User-ID to identify your key; the software constructs the user id from Real Name, Comment and Email Address in this form: "Heinrich Heine (Der Dichter) " Real name: Alan Dayley Invalid character in name Real name: Alan Dayley Invalid character in name Real name: Alan Dayley (Alan) Invalid character in name Real name: "Alan Dayley " Invalid character in name Real name: So here I sit wondering what character is invalid in the 4 attempts above and how do I proceed from here. Any hints? Alan