REFERENCE · 10

The tamatebako root of trust.

Every signed tebako artifact verifies against one OpenPGP root key. This page publishes the root fingerprint and the public key, and shows the commands that verify a downloaded artifact against them.

The root key.

The tamatebako project signs its releases under one OpenPGP root key. The fingerprint below is the whole trust decision: any artifact whose signature chains to this fingerprint is a tamatebako artifact, and any artifact that does not chain to it is not one, whatever its download page claims.

Fingerprint

9E210CA8E9FDE9E6587740B2EFC3C250F7862A48

Key ID (uid)

tamatebako root (classical) <root@tebako.org>

Primary key algorithm

Ed25519 (signing and certification)

Subkeys

one Ed25519 signing subkey, one X25519 encryption subkey

Created

2026-09-09

The fingerprint is also embedded in the tebako tools at build time, so the tools compare it on the operator’s behalf; TEBAKO_TRUSTED_ROOT overrides the embedded value for development keys.

The public key.

The armored public key is served at a stable URL: tebako-key.asc. Its content is reproduced here so the two copies can be compared.

What carries a signature.

Releases published from the signing go-live onward carry three kinds of detached OpenPGP signatures, all made by the signing subkey of the root above:

one <artifact>.asc next to every released part — the tebako tool binaries, the runtime executables, and the payload images;
SHA256SUMS.asc and manifest.json.asc over the release index files, so the digest list itself is authenticated;
per-artifact signatures on registry-published payloads, pinned in the registry entry that names the payload.

Releases older than the go-live carry no .asc files. The following command on such an artifact verifies its integrity instead, through the per-asset digest sidecar described in Verify integrity. Unsigned artifacts stay first-class everywhere: they install and run with a warning, while verification of anything signed is always strict — a bad signature is a refusal, never a warning.

Verifying a download.

Install the root public key into the trusted set once. The following commands store the key under the fingerprint it must have, keyed by name so a swapped file cannot silently redirect trust:

$ mkdir -p ~/.tebako/trust
$ curl -o ~/.tebako/trust/9E210CA8E9FDE9E6587740B2EFC3C250F7862A48.pub \
    https://www.tebako.org/.well-known/tebako-key.asc

The following command on a downloaded artifact then verifies it against the detached signature sitting next to it:

$ ls
tebako-pkg-2.5.0-macos-arm64
tebako-pkg-2.5.0-macos-arm64.asc
$ tebako-pkg verify tebako-pkg-2.5.0-macos-arm64
tebako-pkg-2.5.0-macos-arm64: trusted

A tampered artifact fails closed. The same command prints INVALID SIGNATURE and exits non-zero, and the installer flows refuse the artifact with the signature exit codes (71 for an invalid signature, 72 when the signer is not in the operator’s trusted set).

Rotation and revocation.

Root rotation is a signed hand-off, not a re-trust event: a successor statement signed by the current root authorizes the next one, and the tools forward trust along that chain automatically. A pre-made revocation certificate is stored offline with the root; publishing it at this URL retires the root, and every consumer that sees it rejects the retired fingerprint even for artifacts that once verified.