Versions:
Minisign is a lightweight, portable cryptography utility created by Frank Denis that enables users to apply and verify cryptographic signatures on individual files through the modern Ed25519 public-key algorithm. Released under an open-source license, the program is intentionally minimal: it compiles to a single, dependency-free binary that runs on Windows, macOS, Linux, and the BSD family, making it attractive to developers, system administrators, and privacy-conscious individuals who need trustworthy file authentication without the overhead of larger toolkits. Typical use cases include signing release tarballs, checksum lists, container images, backup archives, or any distributable artifact whose integrity and origin must be provable; recipients simply obtain the signer’s short public key and can confirm, with one command, that the payload has not been altered since it was signed. Because Ed25519 is designed for speed and resistance to side-channel attacks, Minisign operations complete almost instantaneously even on modest hardware, while producing compact 64-byte signatures that travel well alongside the original data. The project’s entire surface area is deliberately small—two sub-commands, “-S” to sign and “-V” to verify—so auditability is high and the learning curve is near zero; secret keys are stored in a format that combines strong KDF-based password protection with optional comment fields for organizational context. Since its introduction the tool has seen two major revisions, of which 0.12 is the current stable release, and both iterations remain interoperable so older signatures continue to validate without re-issuance. Minisign is available for free on get.nero.com, with downloads provided via trusted Windows package sources such as winget, always delivering the latest version and supporting batch installation of multiple applications.
Tags: