i lost my hd, can i recover pgp secret key?
 

hi..

as title says..

do i have to regenerate secret/public key?
or can i somehow recover old secret key?
thanks

The main limit to recovery AFAIK is the amount of destructive disk activity on the disk/partition where the key was stored between the time of deletion and time of shutdown after you discovered your secret key was gone. Next to that, filesystem, cuz I dunno bout tools for Ext3, XFS etc, etc, only Ext2.

First thing you want to try is using the undelete function in "mc" aka Midnight Commander. Never forget to save to a separate partition, but preferably a separate disk altogether, or first "dd" the partition to a file (on a separate disk). If you haven't got "mc" maybe you've got "recover". If you *really* need this key back you can use TCT as a final choice, but be prepared for a lengthy learning and recovery process with minimal chances of retrieval, complete or not.

Here's some links:
Recover (app + info),
R-Linux (never tried this one),
Unrm (never tried this one),
TCT, The Coroners Toolkit.

Undelete HOWTO's:
Linux Partition HOWTO,
How to recover lost partitions,
Linux Ext2fs Undeletion mini-HOWTO,
Linux Partition Rescue mini-HOWTO.

Good luck.

assuming i can't recover it..

i need to regenerate new sec/pub pair and republish new public key?

i was asking if i can do something with my old pub key and passphrase to recover secret key..

thanks again

i need to regenerate new sec/pub pair and republish new public key?
Yes. The only risk is your remote users don't know the "old" key wasn't revoked. Notify 'em.

i was asking if i can do something with my old pub key and passphrase to recover secret key..
No you wasn't. If you where, (not to sound harsh here) learn to rephrase your question until it comes out like a proper formatted one. Don't assume we know (or will try to know) what you're thinking.
If you where able to retrieve your secret key from the combination of your public key and the keyphrase this whole crypto thing would be worthless, wouldn't it?

yeah i thought so..
i just wanted to make sure..

thanks