Glossary of Security Terms: Encryption

In cryptography, encryption is the conversion of cleartext into a coded text or ciphertext. A ciphertext is intended to be unreadable by unauthorized readers.

Encryption is a cryptographic primitive: it transforms a plaintext message into a ciphertext using a cryptographic algorithm called a cipher. ncryption in modern ciphers is performed using a specific algorithm and a secret, called the key. Since the algorithm is often public, the key must stay secret if the encryption stays secure.

Without knowing the secret, the reverse operation, decryption, is mathematically hard to perform. How hard depends on the security of the cryptographic algorithm chosen and evolves with the progress of cryptanalysis.

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• Learn more about Encryption and Decryption

View Previous Terms:

• Block cipher mode of operation
• Certificate authority
• Challenge-response authentication
• Cipher
• Cipher suite
• Ciphertext
• CORS
• CORS-safelisted request header
• CORS-safelisted response header
• Cross-site scripting
• Cryptanalysis
• Cryptographic hash function
• Cryptography
• CSP
• CSRF
• Decryption
• Digital certificate
• DTLS (Datagram Transport Layer Security)
• Forbidden header name
• Forbidden response header name
• Hash
• HMAC
• HPKP
• HSTS
• HTTPS
• Key
• MitM
• OWASP
• Preflight request
• Public-key cryptography
• Reporting directive
• Robots.txt
• Same-origin policy
• Session Hijacking
• SQL Injection
• Symmetric-key cryptography
• TOFU
• Transport Layer Security (TLS)

Credits

• Source: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Glossary/Encryption
• Published under Open CC Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 license