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2. Signing Up To The CryptoMail Service

You only need to enter a name and passphrase for your Email account during signing up for the CryptoMail Service. You should pay attention to this step to avoid mistakes that might cause your account to become inaccessible in the future. If you already have some experience in signing up to an authenticated account such as an ISP, you probably know most of the information in this section.

2.1 Getting Ready

Signing up to the CryptoMail Service is a relatively simple step, but you should do some fact finding about your web browser and name selection for your new Email account.

Your web browser must have support for a 128-Bit Secure Socket Layer (SSL) session to sign up to the service. You will need to find out the strength (128-Bit or 40-Bit) of the SSL in your web browser.

For Microsoft Internet Explorer, you click on the "About Internet Explorer" under the "Help" of the menu bar of your web browser If you are using the Netscape Navigator, you go to the "Help" manual bar for the "Software Updates" menu and obtain the browser security feature from the website of Software Updates in Netscape. Our service is able to serve you on other web browsers with the 128-Bit SSL capability, but you may want to read the user manual of your web browser to get its encryption strength.

Next, you should think about several names for your Email account, so when the name of your choice is not available, you can use another name. For example, if you want john@cryptomail.org, don't be surprised if it's taken. You probably should think about prefixing or postfixing your login name with something that will make it unique like 'longjohn' or 'johnholmes'. You will use this name as your Email address, and you should choose a name that is easy for you, your family and friends to remember.

You should pay extra attention in choosing your passphrase for your Email account, because you cannot access your account without the correct passphrase and nobody except you can reset your passphrase If you forgot your passphrase, there is no way to access your Email account and read your Email messages. You may consider picking a passphrase that is very difficult to guess for others but not for you. Choose a passphrase that is personal and complex. Don't do things like put any correlation with your user name. If you write down your passphrase, put it in a very safe place. If you are going to write down your passphrase, consider masking it within somewhere where it looks benign and is undetectable.

Check Lists:

• A web browser with 128-Bit SSL encryption feature
• Names for your Email account
• Passphrase for your Email account

2.2 Using The Web Form to Sign Up

The CryptoMail Service uses a web form for users to sign up to a new Email account. The web form is a text box in which you can enter an available Email account name. If you are signing up to different CryptoMail Service other than cryptomail.org, you will have different host name following the text box of the form.

After you have entered your desired name for your Email account, you just press enter or hit a submit button.

2.3 Choosing an Email Account Name

An Email account name is the one of the most important choices that you will make. The name will be used as your only identification and Email address of your Email account. Note: you cannot change the Email account name after signing up. For instance, if you choose to use mycryptomail as your Email account name in cryptomail.org, people will use mycryptomail@cryptomail.org to send Email to you.

The CryptoMail Service permits you to use any alphabetical (case insensitive) and digit characters without space for your Email account name using a web form.

• No space
• Case insensitive
• Alphabet characters (A to Z) and (a to z)
• Digit characters (0 to 9)

For example, !peter leung@cryptomail.org is not going be a valid Email account name for our service, because the name has a space and a non-alphabet character (!). A valid Email account name will be pleung123@cryptomail.org, since the name only has alphabet and digit characters without space.

The CryptoMail Service does not have other restriction for the Email account name, but you should pick an Email account name that will be easy for your senders to remember it.

2.4 Choosing an Email Account Passphrase

An Email account passphrase is the key to door of your Email messages. You will use the passphrase to access your Email box every time when you log in to your Email account. By choosing a good passphrase, the CryptoMail Email System can protect your Email messages from any attackers.

After you submit a valid Email account name to a CryptoMail Service for your new Email account, you use the CryptoMail Client (a Java Applet) to enter your passphrase twice to validate your passphrase When you type your passphrase in the text box, asterisk (*) characters will be show in the text box to help prevent other people shoulder surfing behind you from reading your passphrase

The CryptoMail Service accepts passphrase of any alphabet (case sensitive), non-alphabet and digit characters without space. In additional, you must choose a passphrase with at least 8 characters.

• Case Sensitive
• Alphabet characters (A to Z) and (a to z)
• Non-alphabet characters (~!@#$%^&*_+|`-=\:"<>?;',./)
• Digit characters (0 to 9)
• Never use any person's or pat's name

For example, The Secret Of Life Is Not 2 Die is a good passphrase. Please don't use that one :)

Note: Nobody can reset your passphrase If you forgot your passphrase, you will not able to access your account and read your Email messages. It is very important for you to pick a passphrase that you can remember.

2.5 Creating Your Private Key

After you have successfully enter your Email account's name and passphrase, the CryptoMail Service will create a private and public key using our encryption engine for your mail box. You move your mouse pointer randomly within the CryptoMail Client window to generate a private key, until the indicator bar is filled to show the completion of the private key generation.

When you have successfully created your private key for your Email account, we will provide a message during account creation.

Creating your Email account is a computationally intense process, and the process might take from few seconds to 1 minute depending on the system performance.

CryptoMail Users Manual, Version 0.10, 9/25/2000

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