Chapter 5
Encryption Algorithms
IN THIS CHAPTER
Seeing how encryption works
Understanding encryption basics
Looking at symmetric and asymmetric encryption
Cracking encryption with attacks
Encryption involves scrambling information, or plaintext, and converting it into another format — ciphertext — essentially, turning ordered data into seemingly random gibberish. By encrypting information, you can keep data information out of the hands of other people, which can be useful for sending coded messages for military use, sending credit card information over the Internet to online shopping websites, or just hiding your personal documents from the prying eyes of family members, coworkers, or strangers.
How Encryption Works
The simplest form of encryption is a substitution cipher, which basically replaces each letter with a specific symbol, such as another letter. A simple algorithm, called the Caesar cipher, is a substitution cipher that replaces one letter with another letter from the alphabet a fixed distance away, such as replacing the letter A with the letter Z, the letter B with ...
Get Beginning Programming All-in-One For Dummies, 2nd Edition now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
