Java Glossary : RSA

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A pioneering company in digital signatures. The acronym stands for Rivest, Shamir, and Adelman, the inventors of the technique. The RSA algorithm is based on the fact that there is no efficient way to factor very large numbers. Their basic digital signing and encryption patent has expired. I was thus able to use the RSA encryption technique in custom software I write that sends credit card information over the Internet and email. RSA is mainly known for SMIME email encryption software. They no longer issue digital certificates. RSA-signed Applets often refer to the old proprietary Netscape jar-signing scheme. It has been replaced by the Sun-style DSA-signed Applets in Java 1.2. Sun-style RSA-signed Applets were introduced in Java 1.3 and have now largely replaced the DSA scheme.

Public/private keys have many applications including:

Encryption without the need for pre-distributing a shared secret. E.g. to allow the general public to safely send credit card information over the Internet.
Digitally signing documents and code to prove authorship.
Timestamping a document to legally prove it existed on a certain date and was signed on that date.
Electronic id cards where a signing authority vouches for information about the id holder.
Code signing where a signing authority vouches for information about the authorship of a piece of code. This requires only a generic public certificate from the signing authority for validating.
Code signing to detect tampering with code.
Electronic funds transfer.
Automated passwords using challenge phrases to be encrypted with private keys instead.

certificate ¤ DSA

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