A public key posted under your handle

Gone the moment you do it

Publishing a key under a name puts two identifiers in the same place at the same time. That pairing is what readers keep, and it survives every change you make afterwards.

Osiris market addresses

osiriseultmx3so5ef6ayasy4kdyekbywr7pyggpmjazeogxoyaodsyd.onion

osirislivpetlbabbl3zzqhupurfkxxbzbheu3bkrshkaiwg2hcxbyqd.onion

osirisydmlx47esm6ylhzhtnjrucgnymi7beqoyzze5jn3opbr3zy4id.onion

Printed as supplied, in no order. Nothing here is watched or timed, so an address that loads is not proof of anything. More about the set

1.What publishing a key does

A public key is meant to be shared, so the act feels harmless, and by itself it is. The problem is never the key. It is the pairing. A key beside a handle states that this key belongs to this person, and the statement is what you released.

Anyone reading can save both halves in a second. From then on the pair exists in copies you cannot see, held by people who had no plan for it at the time.

Window opens: Only while the post is unpublished text.
Window closes: On publish.
What closes it: The pairing becoming public and copyable.
Still possible after: Use different keys for different names from here on.

2.Revocation says stop trusting, not forget

Revoking a key is a real and useful thing to do. It announces that the key should no longer be used, and anyone who checks will see that. It says nothing about copies already saved, and the old fingerprint still matches the old handle in every archive.

That is the difference between security and privacy in one line. Revocation protects future use. It does not retrieve past association, which is why publishing sits among the six things that close a window.

ImportantThe damage from a published key is almost never that someone can read your messages. It is that a second identity using the same key is now the same person to anyone who compares. Linking problems do not respond to revocation at all.

Read nextOne key used by two identitiesWhat the pairing does once it appears twice under two names.

3.Deleting the post keeps the pair intact

Taking the post down removes the copy you control. It does not remove archives, quotes, mirrors, or the reader who noted the fingerprint. A deleted post is often the one that gets remembered, because deletion is itself interesting to people who watch for it.

The same shape appears with a handle you brought with you. The key version is sharper, because a fingerprint is exact and a name only usually is.

4.What people assume is undone here

That revoking a key removes old copies. It marks the key as no longer to be used. The association is unaffected.
That deleting the post breaks the link. It removes one copy of the link, which was never the only one.
That generating a new key fixes it. It protects the new identity only if you never reuse the old one, which is the hard part.
That nobody keeps these things. Fingerprints are short and exactly what people collect without deciding to.

5.What is still possible

Keep the exposed key for the identity it was published under, and nothing else. Hiding it now achieves less than using it consistently.
Generate a separate key for any name that must stay apart, and never post the two in the same place.
Write down which key belongs to which name, because this is what people get wrong from memory at two in the morning.

A fingerprint is easier to keep than a screenshot.

It is a short string. It fits in a note, a message, a search box. Nobody needs infrastructure to keep one.

So treat the pairing as published the instant it goes out, not as something still under review.

6.The decision that mattered

Which name the key would live under, decided before it was generated rather than after it was posted. Keys are cheap and identities are not, so a separate key per name costs nothing worth arguing about.

For where this sits among things that never close but never blow up, the never but nothing dramatic section is the right neighbourhood, and the index of every action shows how far it sits from the ones with room to move.

Also usefulThe rule: reversibility beats severityWhy a quiet permanent thing outranks a loud recoverable one.

Questions people send in

I revoked the key. Is the association gone?

No. Revocation is an instruction about future use and it is worth doing. The record that this fingerprint sat under this handle is unaffected.

Should I delete the post anyway?

You can, and it slightly reduces the number of copies. Do not be surprised if the deletion draws more attention than the post did.

Can I use the same key for a new name?

You can, and that is the choice that turns a small exposure into a permanent join. Separate names need separate keys or they are not separate.