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Oddball Keychain entries
#50209 10/13/18 11:29 PM
Joined: Aug 2009
Likes: 14
ryck Online OP
OP Online

Joined: Aug 2009
Likes: 14
I have a at least a couple of hundred identical entries in my Keychain that are:

Name: iMessage Encryption Key
Kind: private key
Keychain: login

There are no Modification or Expiry dates. Two questions: 1) What are these? 2) Can I safely ace the whole works?

Last edited by ryck; 10/13/18 11:29 PM.

ryck

"What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits" The Doobie Brothers

iMac (Retina 5K, 27", 2020), 3.8 GHz 8 Core Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 2667 MHz DDR4
OS Ventura 13.6.3
Canon Pixma TR 8520 Printer
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TM on 1TB LaCie USB-C
Re: Oddball Keychain entries
ryck #50228 10/16/18 10:33 AM
Joined: Aug 2017
Offline

Joined: Aug 2017
I have an equal amount of iMessage Encryption Keys and iMessage Signing Keys in my Keychain.
I’m sure they are part of what makes iMessage work securely, encrypting each message, as it travels the hostile Net.
As the keychain may be shared with iOS devices, these keys could have nothing to do with your Mac (if you haven’t set up Messages for macOS), but deleting them on your Mac could break access to (past) iMessage conversations on your iPhone or iPad. There may be no fallback mechanism for decrypting old messages without these keys.

Re: Oddball Keychain entries
Urquhart #50236 10/16/18 06:06 PM
Joined: Aug 2009
Likes: 14
ryck Online OP
OP Online

Joined: Aug 2009
Likes: 14
Okay....good to know, thanks. Since I only discovered them by accident, and was otherwise oblivious to their presence, I'll just leave them be. Better to do nothing and be safe rather than do something and be sorry.


ryck

"What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits" The Doobie Brothers

iMac (Retina 5K, 27", 2020), 3.8 GHz 8 Core Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 2667 MHz DDR4
OS Ventura 13.6.3
Canon Pixma TR 8520 Printer
Epson Perfection V500 Photo Scanner c/w VueScan software
TM on 1TB LaCie USB-C

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