How to create compressed encrypted archives with tar and gpg

There are many reasons why you may want to create compressed encrypted file archives. You may want to create an encrypted backup of your personal files. Another possible scenario is that you may want to privately share content with a friend or colleague over the web or through cloud storage. Tar.gz files, or compressed tarballs, are created using the tar command. These tarballs are pretty much the standard go-to format for archives on GNU/Linux, however they are not encrypted. In the above scenarios that we mentioned it is often desirable to have encryption in order to secure your data. This is where gpg comes in.