I have an email signature for my work email that looks like this:
Jon Ericson: OpenSSL Communities Manager
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#!/bin/perl -sp0777i<X+d*lMLa^*lN%0]dsXx++lMlN/dsM0<j]dsj $/=unpack('H*',$_);$_=`echo 16dio\U$k"SK$/SM$n\EsN0p[lN*1 lK[d2%Sa2/d0$^Ixp"|dc`;s/\W//g;$_=pack('H*',/((..)*)$/)
(There’s an alternate version without the logo for programmer-focused emails.)
I sometimes get questions about that pile of random-seeming characters at the end there so this is my explanation. First what it’s not:
- Cartoon swearing (AKA, grawlix).
- An attempt to break into your email with some sort of exploit.
- Random letters designed to confuse. (Well, not just that.
;-)
Instead it’s a nod to a pre-1999 act of rebellion against a US law that made it illegal to export “strong encryption”. As it turns out, one algorithm could be written in just three lines of code and people started adding that to their email signatures.
So why do I use that signature now that it’s not necessary? Well it’s because I want to signal that secure communication is for everyone, not just people who can afford to pay for it. These days you don’t need Perl. All you need is the OpenSSL command line utility.