Update gpg-agent version (PGP issue)

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PGP encryption is not working in Gajim and some others applications on Whonix Workstation. All logs are here. The error is:

'gpg-agent' is older than us (2.2.40 < 2.4.5)"

How to safely update the GPG-Agent version (from actual 2.2.4)?

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This appears to be an issue with Gajim wanting the most recent gpg-agent package version. Try sudo apt update && sudo apt full-upgrade. The first command tells Whonix to update the repositories known to apt, and full-upgrade asks if there is any new version of installed packages. If you have not updated, this should fix it.

If that doesn’t work, Flatpak might have updated Gajim to a more recent version than a one that might be in Debian’s stable repo’s (which are QA tested by testers that would’ve noticed the gpg-agent error). Try installing directly from Debian if a package for Gajim exists.

If the issue still persists, this is probably due to Debian’s stable repo’s. Debian QA tests packages to make sure that they don’t murder your OS when you start them and that they actually work, so they need to keep the packages downgraded for some time until they can be sure it works correctly and safely. Debian might still be stuck on an older version for gpg-agent.

At this point, your only option is to try Debian’s unstable repo’s to see if they have the most recent version of gpg-agent. You are in uncharted territory at that point, and you should be aware that you will need to re-download pretty much every package if you replace the stable repo’s with unstable, and that you might encounter unexpected errors.

I wish you good luck, and feel free to ask more if needed.

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See wiki chapter: Install Newer Software Versions.

Note:

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@Dreadysa, the reason of this issue is the conflict of the newest version of Gajim (from Flatpak) and the version of gpg-agent (2.2.4). Old Gajim is compatible with 2.2.4. But new Gajim requires the last gpg-agent which cannot be installed in Whonix Workstation 17. A detailed description: PGP plugin 1.6 does not work on Gajim (Flatpak) (#637) · Issues · gajim / gajim-plugins · GitLab (topic and valuable comments below).

Whonix does not allow you to update the gpg-agent with the usual sudo apt update && sudo apt full-upgrade. You get the same 2.2.4 as Debian bookworm (stable): https://packages.debian.org/en/gpg-agent

Therefore, my question was how to update Whonix gpg-agent and do it ​​safe.

@Patrick, thanks. Common direction is understandable. I thought there was a solution from other users who could solve this problem earlier.