Ubuntu Manpage: sq pki authenticate - Authenticate a binding

NAME

       sq pki authenticate - Authenticate a binding

SYNOPSIS

       sq pki authenticate [OPTIONS]

DESCRIPTION

       Authenticate a binding.

       Authenticate  a  binding  (a  certificate  and User ID) by looking for a path from the trust roots to the
       specified  binding  in  the  Web  of  Trust.   Because  certifications  may  express  uncertainty  (i.e.,
       certifications may be marked as conveying only partial or marginal trust), multiple paths may be needed.

       An  error  is  return  if  no  binding  could  be authenticated to the specified level (by default: fully
       authenticated, i.e., a trust amount of 120).

       If any valid paths to the binding are found, they are printed on stdout whether they  are  sufficient  to
       authenticate the binding or not.

OPTIONS

Subcommand options
--amount=AMOUNT
The required amount of trust

120 indicates full authentication; values less than 120 indicate partial authentication. When
`--certification-network` is passed, this defaults to 1200, i.e., this command tries to find 10
paths.

--cert=FINGERPRINT|KEYID
Use certificates with the specified fingerprint or key ID

--certification-network
Treats the network as a certification network

Normally, the authentication machinery treats the Web of Trust network as an authentication
network where a certification only means that the binding is correct, not that the target should
be treated as a trusted introducer. In a certification network, the targets of certifications are
treated as trusted introducers with infinite depth, and any regular expressions are ignored.
Note: The trust amount remains unchanged. This is how most so-called PGP path-finding algorithms
work.

--email=EMAIL
Authenticate the specified email address

This checks whether it is possible to authenticate a user ID with the specified email address.
The user IDs do not need to be self signed. To authenticate a user ID containing just the
specified email address, use `--userid <EMAIL>`.

--gossip
Treats all certificates as unreliable trust roots

This option is useful for figuring out what others think about a certificate (i.e., gossip or
hearsay). In other words, this finds arbitrary paths to a particular certificate.

Gossip is useful in helping to identify alternative ways to authenticate a certificate. For
instance, imagine Ed wants to authenticate Laura's certificate, but asking her directly is
inconvenient. Ed discovers that Micah has certified Laura's certificate, but Ed hasn't yet
authenticated Micah's certificate. If Ed is willing to rely on Micah as a trusted introducer, and
authenticating Micah's certificate is easier than authenticating Laura's certificate, then Ed has
learned about an easier way to authenticate Laura's certificate.

Stable since 1.1.0.

--show-paths
Show why a binding is authenticated

By default, only a user ID and certificate binding's degree of authentication (a value between 0
and 120) is shown. This changes the output to also show how that value was computed by showing
the paths from the trust roots to the bindings.

--unusable
Show bindings that are unusable

Normally, unusable certificates and bindings are not shown. This option considers bindings, even
if they are not unusable, because they (or the certificates) are not valid according to the
policy, are revoked, or are not live.

This option only makes sense with `--gossip`, because unusable bindings are still considered
unauthenticated.

Stable since 1.1.0.

--userid=USERID
Authenticate the specified user ID

The specified user ID does not need to be self signed.

Global options
See sq(1) for a description of the global options.

EXAMPLES

       Authenticate a specific binding.

              sq pki authenticate --cert \
                     EB28F26E2739A4870ECC47726F0073F60FD0CBF0 --userid \
                     "Alice <alice@example.org>"

       Check whether we can authenticate any user ID with the specified email address for the given certificate.

              sq pki authenticate --cert \
                     EB28F26E2739A4870ECC47726F0073F60FD0CBF0 --email \
                     alice@example.org

VERSION