The Secret Security Wiki
Cryptography and encryption are the building blocks of the cybersecurity industry. AES, DES, and RSA are some of the terms you will hear often in the industry, and in this part of the blog you will learn about the different uses of cryptography and how encryption is a part of everything we do online.
Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA) is a Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA) which uses keys derived from elliptic curve cryptography (ECC). While functionally providing the same outcome as other digital signing algorithms, because ECDSA is based on the more efficient elliptic curve cryptography, ECDSA requires smaller keys to provide equivalent security and is therefore more...
Diffie Hellman (DH) key exchange algorithm is a method for securely exchanging cryptographic keys over a public communications channel. Keys are not actually exchanged – they are jointly derived. It is named after their inventors Whitfield Diffie and Martin Hellman. If Alice and Bob wish to communicate with each other, they first agree between them...
A cryptographic hash function is a special class of hash functions that map data of arbitrary size to a probabilistically unique bit string of a fixed size – the hash. What distinguishes a cryptographic hash function is that it is designed to be a one-way function, which means it is not practically possible to invert –...
End-to-end encryption (E2EE) is a system of communication where only the communicating parties can read the messages. When implemented properly, E2EE prevents potential eavesdroppers – including telecom providers, Internet providers, and even the provider of the communication service – from being able to access and decrypt the messages exchanged or the cryptographic keys needed to...
Salted secured hash algorithm helps protect password hashes against dictionary attacks by introducing additional randomness. Password hash salting is when random data – a salt – is used as an additional input to a hash function that hashes a password. The goal of salting is to defend against dictionary attacks or attacks against hashed passwords...
Pairing-based cryptography is based on pairing functions that map pairs of points on an elliptic curve into a finite field. The unique properties of these pairing functions have enabled many new cryptographic protocols that had not been previously feasible. Pairings are useful in cryptography because if constructed properly, they can produce finite fields that are...
Identity-based encryption is a type of public-key encryption in which a user can generate a public key from a known unique identifier such as an email address), and a trusted third-party server calculates the corresponding private key from the public key. In this way, there is no need to distribute public keys ahead of exchanging...
Secret Sharing refers to cryptographic methods for taking a secret, breaking it up into multiple shares, and distributing the shares among multiple parties, so that only when the parties bring together their respective shares can the secret be reconstructed. More specifically, the holder of a secret, sometimes referred to as the dealer, creates n shares...
Quantum cryptography utilizes the laws of physics, as opposed to mathematical assumptions, to enable the secure exchange of a secret key between two parties. It is considered more robust because mathematical assumptions can unravel with the advent of stronger computing power, whereas physics laws cannot be broken. For two parties to exchange a secret key,...
Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) is a symmetric block cipher used extensively in industry and government. The United States National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) developed AES to replace Data Encryption Standard (DES), for which various attacks began to be published. In its requirements, NIST specified the new advanced encryption standard algorithm must be a...
Symmetric key cryptography is any cryptographic algorithm that is based on a shared key that is used to encrypt or decrypt text/cyphertext, in contrast to asymmetric key cryptography, where the encryption and decryption keys are different. Symmetric encryption is generally more efficient than asymmetric encryption and therefore preferred when large amounts of data need to...