Using PKI with Thunderbird

Open Thunderbird and select Tools | Account Settings | Security:

Click on the View Certificates button ('Manage Certificates' in older versions).

On the Your Certificates tab, click the Import button.


Browse to the location where your digital certificate is stored and click Open to import the certificate.

If the certificate has imported correctly you will see the certificate listed on the Your Certificates tab. Click OK to close this window.
 

You should return to the security options. Click the Select button within the 'Digital Signing' section.

In the drop-down menu for the list of digital certificates you have available, select the digital certificate you would like to use and click OK:

You will be prompted with a message asking you if you want to use this same certificate for encryption. Click OK if you do (recommended).

Click OK again, and you should be back in Thunderbird.

Now when you create an email message, you should have a drop-down menu under 'Security' where you can select to 'Encrypt This Message' and/or 'Digitally Sign This Message'.



Your digital signature enables the recipient of your message to verify that you actually sent the message and that it was not altered along the route. Signing a message does not affect the contents of the message in any way or protect the message from being intercepted and read by someone other than the intended recipient.

To ensure that only the recipient can read a message, you must also encrypt the message. NOTE: Both the sender and recipient of the email need to have encryption setup before it is possible to successfully send/receive encrypted email messages from each other.