View Source: PublicKey - Waikato Linux Users Group

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[PublicKey]s and [PrivateKey]s are generated in matched pairs in PublicKeyEncryption. The PublicKey can decrypt anything encrypted with its PrivateKey and visa-versa, but the public key is unable to decrypt anything it encrypts itself and the private key is unable to decrypt anything it encrypts itself. This enables the creation of a [Signature], in which a [CryptographicHash] of a message is created, encrypted with the private key and appended to the message. Anybody with the public key can decrypt the signature and run the cryptographic hash of a message (without the appended signature) and check that they are the same, but only someone with the private key could have created it. This is the basis of all PublicKey [Cryptography].

Standards for the use of [PublicKey]s include [SSL] [X509] and [OpenPGP], systems include: [OpenSSL], [SSH], PGP and  [GPG].

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Part of CategoryCryptography

Last edited on Wednesday, March 24, 2004 9:00:40 am by AristotlePagaltzis

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