Cryptology/Related Articles: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 18:15, 31 July 2010

Information security [r]: The set of policies and protective measures used to ensure appropriate confidentiality, integrity and availability to information; usually assumed to be information in a computer or telecommunications network but the principles extend to people and the physical world ^[e]
Signals intelligence [r]: the practice of acquiring information through monitoring the electromagnetic signals deliberately trasmitted by an opponent, including communications (COMINT) and non-communications electronics such as radar (ELINT). ^[e]

Cryptography [r]: A field at the intersection of mathematics and computer science that is concerned with the security of information, typically the confidentiality, integrity and authenticity of some message. ^[e]
Cryptanalysis [r]: The sub-field of cryptology which deals with breaking into existing codes and ciphers. ^[e]
Cipher [r]: A means of combining plaintext (of letters or numbers, or bits), using an algorithm that mathematically manipulates the individual elements of plaintext, into ciphertext, a form unintelligible to any recipient that does not know both the algorithm and a randomizing factor called a cryptographic key ^[e]
Random number generator [r]: A member of a sequence of which the successive values cannot be predicted, produced by measurement of physical phenomena, appropriate algorithms, or a combination of the two ^[e]
Cryptographic hash [r]: Add brief definition or description
Code (cryptography) [r]: A means of substituting, for the linguistically meaningful symbols of plaintext composed of words or other symbols meaningful to humans, into inherently meaningless numbers, letters, or words that make no sense to a recipient who is not in possession of a codebook or other means of reversing the substitution of symbols ^[e]
Cryptographic key [r]: Value used by a computer together with a complex algorithm to encrypt and decrypt messages. ^[e]

Data Encryption Standard [r]: A block cipher specification issued by the U.S. government in 1976, intended for sensitive but unclassified data. It is now obsolescent, succeeded by the Advanced Encryption Standard, but still used in commercial systems. ^[e]
Advanced Encryption Standard [r]: A US government standard issued in 2002 for a stronger block cipher to succeed the earlier Data Encryption Standard. ^[e]
Enigma machine [r]: The primary high-security cryptographic communications security machine of Nazi Germany. Unknown to the Germans, it had been substantially cryptanalyzed by the British Government Code and Cipher School, with French, Polish, and U.S. help. ^[e]
PURPLE machine [r]: Add brief definition or description

William Friedman [r]: Possibly the greatest cryptologist in history, he pioneered the application of mathematics to cryptanalysis and built the U.S. Army Signal Intelligence Service technical base. ^[e]
Auguste Kerckhoffs [r]: A 19th Century French writer, famous for giving some axioms for cryptography. ^[e]
Alan Turing [r]: British mathematician, code breaker and computer pioneer. ^[e]
Claude Shannon [r]: (1916-2001) American theoretical mathematician, founder of information theory. ^[e]
Sir Francis Walsingham [r]: Add brief definition or description

Communications intelligence [r]: The subset of SIGINT concerned with signals intended to be intelligible to human beings, in the form of voice, messages, or images. ^[e]
Communications Security Establishment [r]: The Canadian government organization responsible for communications security and signals intelligence ^[e]
Government Communications Headquarters [r]: The British government agency responsible for signals intelligence and information assurance ^[e]
Government Communications Security Bureau [r]: Add brief definition or description
National Security Agency [r]: Add brief definition or description
Signals intelligence [r]: the practice of acquiring information through monitoring the electromagnetic signals deliberately trasmitted by an opponent, including communications (COMINT) and non-communications electronics such as radar (ELINT). ^[e]
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act [r]: Add brief definition or description

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 == Famous instances ==
+{{r|Data Encryption Standard}}
 {{r|Advanced Encryption Standard}}
-{{r|Data Encryption Standard}}
 {{r|Enigma machine}}
 {{r|PURPLE machine}}