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CIAN

Definition

Confidentiality, Integrity, Authentication, Non-repudiation. The four properties a cryptosystem can deliver, usually not all at once with a single primitive. Bulk encryption gives confidentiality; a MAC gives integrity and authentication; a digital signature adds non-repudiation.

Related terms

Asymmetric Key Pair
Mathematically linked public and private keys. The public key encrypts or verifies, the private key decrypts or signs. Two to three orders...
Confusion and Diffusion
Shannon's 1949 design principles. Confusion makes the relationship between key and ciphertext as complex as possible; diffusion spreads each plaintext bit's influence...
Hybrid Encryption
The pattern every real protocol uses: asymmetric crypto exchanges a fresh symmetric session key, then the symmetric primitive does the heavy lifting...
Perfect Forward Secrecy
A property where compromise of a long-term key does not retroactively break past sessions, because each session used an ephemeral key (typically...
Symmetric Key
One shared secret used to both encrypt and decrypt. Fast (AES-128 on AES-NI runs at multiple GB/s) but solves nothing if the...

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