One possibility is that I encrypted the message with the wrong key. I send encrypted messages to a lot of people, so it could have been a mix up on my part. However, when I decrypt my message to you it says: gpg: encrypted with RSA key, ID 0F20A9A9 gpg: encrypted with 4096-bit RSA key, ID CC925AD7, created 2012-12-19    "astor <astorx@tormail.org>" As you can see, I encrypted it to myself and to another key. Now, when I look at the key linked in your signature, pub 2048R/D3754D61 2012-11-02 [expires: 2017-11-01] uid         Libertarian <libertarian@tormail.org> sub 2048R/0F20A9A9 2012-11-02 [expires: 2017-11-01] Notice, it's the same key id 0F20A9A9, so I encrypted it with the right key. Your error message says the secret key is missing. That means you don't have that key in your key ring. Look at the keys in your PGP program and make sure it is there. If you accidentally deleted it, hopefully you have a backup and can import it again.