Creating a functioning encyption key hierarchy

[LsD]

Hello EZ!
I was wondering if anyone could elaborate on the subject of S/MIME keys, certification authorities and creating hierarchies--rather than the horizontal authentication et cetera that PGP permits? I'm trying to help a group of friends secure their communications ( mobile, email, browser etc) and I was wondering if there were some way to establish myself as the certification authority (i.e,. the parent key at the top of the hierarchy)
If I'm mistaken about this in some way or if I'm not describing it properly, I apologize.

Thanks in advance!

Lsd

[proxx]

Hello EZ!
I was wondering if anyone could elaborate on the subject of S/MIME keys, certification authorities and creating hierarchies--rather than the horizontal authentication et cetera that PGP permits? I'm trying to help a group of friends secure their communications ( mobile, email, browser etc) and I was wondering if there were some way to establish myself as the certification authority (i.e,. the parent key at the top of the hierarchy)
If I'm mistaken about this in some way or if I'm not describing it properly, I apologize.

Thanks in advance!

Lsd

I think you want to create a certificate yourself and install it on the clients , there is wide support for added certs.
This way you can have a trust relation.
Better yet you can forbid anyone else from connecting.
This will only count in the scenario where you host the services yourself(trusted users), otherwise your question doesnt make sense at all.

[LsD]

Thanks for your reply, you did in fact answer an additional question I had. I've done more reading about P/MIME and how it differs from GPG--and have realized that my original question wasn't very clear or sensible. Thanks for your help regardless.