Outlook signed messages appear to have an attachment?

[Mark J. McGinty]

[apologies for multi-posting, posting to the other NG was inadvertent]

As you may know, when you digitally sign an email to an Outlook user, the
signature crypto block in a signed email is sent as one part in MIME
multi-part format. I can also
see (using OE's distressingly more capable message source viewer) that the
content-disposition of the signature block is 'attachment'.

So I'm sure someone will say that it's 'correct behavior' for Outlook to
show the attachment (paperclip) icon on any signed message -- but let's get
real here: a digital sig isn't any more an attachment, in the conventional
sense, than is a TNEF block. There is no file the average user can save-off
and utilize, and none of the Inspector-based UI typically associated with
actual
attachments is present.

I see nothing positive that this UI flaw offers, but the negative aspects
are quite clear: recipients are no longer able to easily identify which of
my emails include a regular attachment. I send attachments with maybe
1%-10% of my outbound emails; if I sign my email, 100% look like something's
attached from the Explorer view -- 90% to 99% of them look that way
frivolously, meaninglessly and incorrectly.

It's been like this across so many versions, it must be design -- does
anyone know why this would be?

Thanks,
Mark McGinty

 

[BillR [MVP]]

lucky it does or many users would not know they can save the "attached"
certificate to allow encrypted email to that person.

 

[Mark J. McGinty]

Thanks for your response...

lucky it does or many users would not know they can save the "attached"
certificate to allow encrypted email to that person.

But the UI to do that is not the File->Save Attachments interface, as it is
with regular attachments, you must click the certificate button and edit
trust (which automatically saves the cert in the appropriate store.)

Clicking the File->Save Attachments menu is just a no-op -- thus much of my
point of contention: if it is not treated as a regular attachment, then why
the spurious paper clip? There is further UI, specific to certs, and
trusting them, therefore overloading the paperclip as an additional
indicator is unnecessary (as well as an interference with its intended
meaning.)

So I'm afraid that explanation doesn't work for me. I think OE has it
right, and I wish they would fix Outlook to work correctly too (which will
of course, first require them to agree it's broken, as is) some time soon.


-Mark

--
Bill R MVP

[apologies for multi-posting, posting to the other NG was inadvertent]

As you may know, when you digitally sign an email to an Outlook user, the
signature crypto block in a signed email is sent as one part in MIME
multi-part format. I can also
see (using OE's distressingly more capable message source viewer) that
the
content-disposition of the signature block is 'attachment'.

So I'm sure someone will say that it's 'correct behavior' for Outlook to
show the attachment (paperclip) icon on any signed message -- but let's
get
real here: a digital sig isn't any more an attachment, in the
conventional
sense, than is a TNEF block. There is no file the average user can
save-off
and utilize, and none of the Inspector-based UI typically associated with
actual
attachments is present.

I see nothing positive that this UI flaw offers, but the negative aspects
are quite clear: recipients are no longer able to easily identify which
of
my emails include a regular attachment. I send attachments with maybe
1%-10% of my outbound emails; if I sign my email, 100% look like
something's
attached from the Explorer view -- 90% to 99% of them look that way
frivolously, meaninglessly and incorrectly.

It's been like this across so many versions, it must be design -- does
anyone know why this would be?

Thanks,
Mark McGinty