CISSP Fix

Cryptography is a technique of encrypting and decrypting messages. When the text is encrypted, it is unreadable by humans. When the text is decrypted, it is readable by the humans. The terms used in cryptography are as follows: Plain text: This text can be read by a user. Cipher text: This text can be converted to a non-readable format. Encryption: It is the process of creating a cipher text from a plain text. Decryption: It is the process of converting a cipher text to a plain text. Cipher: It is an algorithm that is used to encrypt and decrypt text. Key: Keys are the elements that are used in the technology of encrypting and decrypting text. For more information read Cryptographic attack

What is MD5?

This centaury stands on the edge of new modern methods of attacks and advancement in the speed of computation, which taken over the best known secure secret-key algorithm such as DES, Digital Encryption Standard conquered the world of cryptography for centuries. A 40 bit version of the DES algorithm can be easily cracked by any modern computer and a 56 bit can be broken by any cheaply available Super Computer or by a simple beo-wulf cluster. That poses a security threat and people have developed, developing various other algorithms like 3DES also known as Triple DES etc, The NIST and NSA plays an important role in deciding the algorithms. They analyze and recommend the algorithm for usage.