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> Well, yes? What is the alternative, if I want to email someone who exists only in the form of a pseudonymous online identity?

If you want to communicate with someone specific then presumably there's something that distinguishes that person from other people. Find a way to connect that something with a key fingerprint. E.g. if the point is that that someone is a journalist for the New York Times (as when Snowden was first looking to leak), they should publish their fingerprint in the NYT, or at least something NYT-official (like their website).

There are use cases where trust-on-first-use is adequate, sure. But there are use cases where it isn't.




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