This guide is part of my series: The Ultimate Guide to GPG for Email Security. This particular page is about installing and configuring the GPG program on your computer.

The Ultimate Guide to GPG Series can be found here:

Installing GPG on MacOS

Go and install gpgtools for Mac OS. That is all for now.

Configuring gnupg on Mac OS

After you install gpg on the Mac you will find a file: $HOME/.gnupg/gpg.conf. Change it to look like this:

auto-key-retrieve
no-emit-version
no-comments
no-greeting
charset utf-8
fixed-list-mode
keyid-format 0xlong
list-options show-uid-validity
verify-options show-uid-validity
require-cross-certification
no-symkey-cache
throw-keyids
use-agent
armor

personal-cipher-preferences AES256 AES192 AES
personal-digest-preferences SHA512 SHA384 SHA256
personal-compress-preferences Uncompressed
default-preference-list SHA512 SHA384 SHA256 AES256 AES192 AES Uncompressed
cert-digest-algo SHA512
s2k-cipher-algo AES256
s2k-digest-algo SHA512
s2k-mode 3
s2k-count 65011712

disable-cipher-algo 3DES
weak-digest SHA1
force-mdc