MINISIGN(1) MINISIGN(1)

NAME

minisign - A dead simple tool to sign files and verify signatures.

SYNOPSIS

minisign -G [-p pubkey_file] [-s seckey_file] [-W]

minisign -R [-s seckey_file] [-p pubkey_file]

minisign -C [-s seckey_file] [-W]

minisign -S [-H] [-x sig_file] [-s seckey_file] [-c
untrusted_comment] [-t trusted_comment] -m file [file ...]

minisign -V [-x sig_file] [-p pubkey_file | -P pubkey] [-o] [-q] -m
file

DESCRIPTION

Minisign is a dead simple tool to sign files and verify signatures.

It is portable, lightweight, and uses the highly secure Ed25519
http://ed25519.cr.yp.to/ public-key signature system.

OPTIONS

These options control the actions of minisign.

-G Generate a new key pair

-C Change/remove the password of a secret key

-R Recreate a public key file from a secret key file

-S Sign files

-V Verify that a signature is valid for a given file

-H Requires the input to be prehashed

-l Sign using the legacy format

-m <file>
File to sign/verify

-o Combined with -V, output the file content after verification

-p <pubkey_file>
Public key file (default: ./minisign.pub)

-P <pubkey>
Public key, as a base64 string

-s <seckey_file>
Secret key file (default: ~/.minisign/minisign.key)

-W Do not encrypt/decrypt the secret key with a password

-x <sig_file>
Signature file (default: <file>.minisig)

-c <comment>
Add a one-line untrusted comment

-t <comment>
Add a one-line trusted comment

-q Quiet mode, suppress output

-Q Pretty quiet mode, only print the trusted comment

-f Force. Combined with -G, overwrite a previous key pair

-v Display version number

EXAMPLES

Creating a key pair

minisign -G

The public key is printed and put into the minisign.pub file. The
secret key is encrypted and saved as a file named
~/.minisign/minisign.key.

Signing files

$ minisign -Sm myfile.txt $ minisign -Sm myfile.txt myfile2.txt *.c

Or to include a comment in the signature, that will be verified and
displayed when verifying the file:

$ minisign -Sm myfile.txt -t 'This comment will be signed as well'

The secret key is loaded from ${MINISIGN_CONFIG_DIR}/minisign.key,
~/.minisign/minisign.key, or its path can be explicitly set with the
-s <path> command-line switch.

Verifying a file

$ minisign -Vm myfile.txt -P <pubkey>

or

$ minisign -Vm myfile.txt -p signature.pub

This requires the signature myfile.txt.minisig to be present in the
same directory.

The public key can either reside in a file (./minisign.pub by
default) or be directly specified on the command line.

Notes
Signature files include an untrusted comment line that can be freely
modified, even after signature creation.

They also include a second comment line, that cannot be modified
without the secret key.

Trusted comments can be used to add instructions or
application-specific metadata (intended file name, timestamps,
resource identifiers, version numbers to prevent downgrade attacks).

AUTHOR

Frank Denis (github [at] pureftpd [dot] org)

January 2023 MINISIGN(1)