From the course: Cisco Network Security: Core Security Concepts

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Protecting integrity using a hash function

Protecting integrity using a hash function - Cisco Tutorial

From the course: Cisco Network Security: Core Security Concepts

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Protecting integrity using a hash function

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- [Teacher] A hash function is a cryptographic technique that protects data integrity. So what's the difference between a hash versus encryption? Well, encryption uses a key or pair of keys. When we encrypt a message, we can decrypt the message as long as we have the key. Unlike encryption, a hash is one way, meaning you cannot generate the original message from the hash. Now we use hash functions in a number of different applications that can include authenticating a message. We can also use a hash to monitor data integrity, store passwords, and it's even used in blockchain technology. When we think about a hash algorithm, there are various cryptographic requirements in order to be a secure hash algorithm. One is that it can be applied to any block of data of any size, and what this hash will then create is a fixed-sized output. The output will depend on the algorithm. With a hash, it has to be easy to compute and…

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