Public Versus Private Keyservers
Many publicly accessible key servers, located around the world, are computers which store and provide OpenPGP keys over the Internet for users of that cryptosystem. In this instance, the computers can be, and mostly are, run by individuals as a pro bono service, facilitating the web of trust model PGP uses.
Several publicly accessible S/MIME key servers are available to publish or retrieve certificates used with the S/MIME cryptosystem.
There are also multiple proprietary public key infrastructure systems which maintain key servers for their users; those may be private or public, and only the participating users are likely to be aware of those keyservers at all.
Read more about this topic: Key Server (cryptographic)
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