Data Encryption

3 Key excerpts on "Data Encryption"

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  eBook - ePub

  Testing and Securing Web Applications

  • Ravi Das, Greg Johnson(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Auerbach Publications

    (Publisher)

  At this point, the message must be unscrambled in order for it to make sense to the receiving party. For example, a very simple example of this is “I LOVE YOU.” The sending party would scramble this message by rearranging the letters as “UYO I VEOL.” This message would then stay in this scrambled format while it is in transit, until it is received by the other party. The receiving party would then descramble it, so it would read once again “I LOVE YOU.” So, if this message were to have been captured by a third party, the content would be rendered useless and totally undecipherable to them. This, in very simple terms, is the science of cryptography.

  Specifically, cryptography can be defined as “the practice and study of techniques for secure communication in the presence of third parties (called adversaries). More generally, it is about constructing and analyzing that overcome the influence of adversaries and which are related to the various aspects of data confidentiality, data integrity, authentication, and repudiation.”1

  Cryptography intersects with other branches of study, especially that of mathematics and computer sciences, and even biometrics, into the new field known as biocryptography. This will be examined in more detail, later in this chapter, after some of the more fundamental concepts have been covered.

  Encryption and Decryption

  In terms of cryptography, scrambling and descrambling are also known as encryption and decryption, respectively. So, for instance, the written message of “I LOVE YOU” when scrambled by the sending party becomes what is known as the “encrypted message,” meaning that it has been disguised in such a manner that it would be totally meaningless, or in the terms of cryptography, it would be what is known as undecipherable.

  Also, encryption can be further defined and described as the “conversion of information from a readable state to apparent nonsense.”1 Now, when the receiving party receives this encrypted written message, it must be descrambled into an understandable and comprehensible state of context. This process of descrambling is known as decryption.

  So, rather than saying that cryptography is the science of scrambling and descrambling, it can now be referred to as the science of encryption and decryption. Specific terms are also used for the encrypted message and the decrypted message. For example, the decrypted message, when it is returned into its plain or original state of context, which is comprehensible and decipherable, is also known as cleartext or plaintext.

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  eBook - ePub

  Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH) v12 312-50 Exam Guide

  • Dale Meredith, Christopher Rees(Authors)
  • 2022(Publication Date)
  • Packt Publishing

    (Publisher)

  "No, it was you because it was encrypted with your key."

  Cryptography also brings authentication to the table. Sometimes we visit websites where it's important that we authenticate who we say we are, as well as obviously wanting to authenticate our credit card information, right? So, it's important to us, especially to those within our industry.

  And, of course, confidentiality is another major factor as far as what cryptography can do for us. As far as confidentiality is concerned, we can only make certain resources available to authorized users. Now, as far as how this process works or how cryptography works, these are at a very plain or elementary level. The process goes like this.

  We have plaintext ; this is the text that is formatted and that we can read. Maybe it's a Word document, maybe it's an email, but it gets encrypted using an algorithm, such as the Data Encryption Standard (DES ) or the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES ), or even Rivest—Shamir—Adleman (RSA ). After the encryption has been applied, we refer to that whole document as ciphertext. It's completely unreadable. This file is then transmitted, and on the opposite end, it just goes through the opposite process, right? The ciphertext uses the keys it's aware of to do decryption, and then it gives us the plaintext that the original sender or the resource wanted us to see.

  Cryptography is an important part of keeping our information safe and secure and is used in a variety of different applications. Everything from our email to our financial information is protected by cryptography, and it's important to understand how it works.

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  The Cybersecurity Body of Knowledge

  The ACM/IEEE/AIS/IFIP Recommendations for a Complete Curriculum in Cybersecurity

  • Daniel Shoemaker, Anne Kohnke, Ken Sigler(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • CRC Press

    (Publisher)

  One problem with software encryption is that, similar to applications, it can be subject to attacks to exploit its vulnerabilities. As a result, many organizations are turning to a more secure option, cryptography embedded directly into the hardware. Hardware encryption cannot be exploited like software encryption. Hardware encryption emerged as a means for protecting data on USB devices and later evolved to include capabilities for encrypting standard hard drives. More sophisticated hardware encryption options include self-encrypting drives, the trusted platform module (which is a chip providing cryptographic services inserted onto the motherboard), and the hardware security model providing cryptography directly within the computer’s processor.

  Data Erasure

  Unlike the early days of computer systems where data was simply stored on punch cards and in the rare case some other form of legacy electronic media, the modern storage environment is rapidly evolving. Data may pass through multiple organizations, systems, and storage media in its lifetime. The pervasive nature of data propagation is only increasing as the Internet and data storage systems move toward a distributed cloud-based architecture. As a result, more organizations than ever are responsible for effective disposal of media and the potential is substantial for residual sensitive data to be collected and retained on the media. This responsibility is not limited to those organizations that are the originators or final resting places of sensitive data but also intermediaries who transiently store or process the information along the way. The efficient and effective management of information from inception through disposition is the responsibility of all those who have handled the data. The application of sophisticated access controls and encryption helps reduce the likelihood that an attacker can gain direct access to sensitive information. As a result, attackers attempting to obtain sensitive information may seek to focus their efforts on alternative access means such as retrieving residual data on media that has left an organization exposed to data theft, without enough sanitization effort having been applied. Consequently, the application of effective sanitization techniques and tracking of storage media are critical aspects of ensuring that sensitive data is effectively protected by an organization against unauthorized disclosure.

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