Can you sign a message using Bitcoin?

[Mike Jones]

In a lot  of places I live in, the government's use a GPG-signing system for documents and contracts. It makes business easier sometimes.

Is there a way I could sign a document using my wallet's identifiers? I believe they are called public and private keys, like the GPG system?

[rjk]

You can sign, but because of the technology used you can't encrypt. In the current 0.6+ release of the reference bitcoin client, go to the "Receive Coins" tab, select an address, and click "Sign Message".

To verify, the recipient will need the exact message, the signature, and the bitcoin address that you signed from. Verification can currently only be done with bitcoind, the commandline version of the client.

[Mike Jones]

You can sign, but because of the technology used you can't encrypt. In the current 0.6+ release of the reference bitcoin client, go to the "Receive Coins" tab, select an address, and click "Sign Message".

To verify, the recipient will need the exact message, the signature, and the bitcoin address that you signed from. Verification can currently only be done with bitcoind, the commandline version of the client.

Wow. You guys thought of everything.

Thanks, I may need this some time.