A public and private key
If the keys are different, then it is asymmetrical. If it is the same key used twice to encode and decode; then it is symmetrical.
When you reference a "public key" you are implying that the file has been encrypted using "asymmetric cryptography". In asymmetric cryptography, encryption and decryption depend on a key PAIR. The user retains their private key and publishes their public key. Anyone can encrypt a file using the user's public key and send it to them. The only person who should be able to decrypt a file encrypted with that public key is the holder of the private key - which, unless the user has made the mistake of sharing their private key - means that only the original user can decrypt the messages sent to them. Most of the asymmetric encryption algorithms use pretty much the same method to decrypt that was used to encrypt, but use the "other" key from the key pair. Messages encrypted using the private key can only be decrypted using the public key - which provides some authentication that the message indeed came from the holder of the private key. Messages encrypted using the public key can only be decrypted by the holder of the private key, so messages sent to them should be secure.
The asymmetric key algorithms are used to create a mathematically related key pair: a secret private keyand a published public key.
This is known as public-key cryptography, or asymmetric cryptography which is used to secure electronic communication over a network.
I've used Kakasoft Folder Protector for file encryption. It adopts 256-bit AES encryption technology and is able to encrypt files on computer or drive.
The meaning of asymmetric encryption is that one key that is unique to a recipient is used only to decrypt data instead of a key being used to encrypt and decrypt that data.
Asymmetric Encryption is a form of Encryption where keys come in pairs. What one key encrypts, only the other can decrypt. Frequently (but not necessarily), the keys are interchangeable, in the sense that if key A encrypts a message, then B can decrypt it, and if key B encrypts a message, then key A can decrypt it. While common, this property is not essential to asymmetric encryption. Asymmetric Encryption is also known as Public Key Cryptography, since users typically create a matching key pair, and make one public while keeping the other secret. Users can "sign" messages by encrypting them with their private keys. This is effective since any message recipient can verify that the user's public key can decrypt the message, and thus prove that the user's secret key was used to encrypt it. If the user's secret key is, in fact, secret, then it follows that the user, and not some impostor, really sent the message. Users can send secret messages by encrypting a message with the recipient's public key. In this case, only the intended recipient can decrypt the message, since only that user should have access to the required secret key. The key to successful use of Asymmetric Encryption is a Key Management system, which implements a Public Key Infrastructure. Without this, it is difficult to establish the reliability of public keys, or even to conveniently find suitable ones.
If the keys are different, then it is asymmetrical. If it is the same key used twice to encode and decode; then it is symmetrical.
An encryption key
Type your answer here... AsymmetricAnswer Explanation: Asymmetric encryption uses a key pair, a public key, and a private key for the encryption and decryption process. One key is used to encrypt the information, and the other key is used to decrypt it. Asymmetric encryption uses Rivest Shamir Adleman (RSA) as a common asymmetric solution to encrypt information.It could be that the person posing the question was looking for SSL (or TLS) which use encryption to secure communications. While RSA is not the only encryption method accepted, both SSL and TLS can, and commonly DO, use RSA as the negotiated encryption scheme.
When you reference a "public key" you are implying that the file has been encrypted using "asymmetric cryptography". In asymmetric cryptography, encryption and decryption depend on a key PAIR. The user retains their private key and publishes their public key. Anyone can encrypt a file using the user's public key and send it to them. The only person who should be able to decrypt a file encrypted with that public key is the holder of the private key - which, unless the user has made the mistake of sharing their private key - means that only the original user can decrypt the messages sent to them. Most of the asymmetric encryption algorithms use pretty much the same method to decrypt that was used to encrypt, but use the "other" key from the key pair. Messages encrypted using the private key can only be decrypted using the public key - which provides some authentication that the message indeed came from the holder of the private key. Messages encrypted using the public key can only be decrypted by the holder of the private key, so messages sent to them should be secure.
Mostly for performance - symmetric encryption is much much faster (order of magnitudes) than asymmetric encryption.
private and primary key
It could be asymmetric encryption, which is where different keys are used to encrypt and decrypt the content. Digital certificates can be used to encrypt the content too. Also digital signatures use a digital certificate to authenticate that content is genuine and unchanged in transit. I don't think there's a name for certificate encryption specifically.
Encryption of a file scrambles its contents so as to make it unreadable until it is decrypted. You provide the secret encryption keyword (sometimes called a password) used in the encryption process so that only you (or a person you wish to allow to read it) can later decrypt it.
AxCrypt from Axantum Software is a free open source file encryption program for Windows PCs. It can be used to encrypt, decrypt, compress, store and send files.
From another user: Symmetric cryptography uses the same secret (private) key to encrypt and decrypt its data whereas asymmetric uses both a public and private key. Symmetric requires that the secret key be known by the party encrypting the data and the party decrypting the data. Asymmetric allows for distribution of your public key to anyone with which they can encrypt the data they want to send securely and then it can only be decoded by the person having the private key. This eliminates the need of having to give someone the secret key (as with symmetric encryption) and risk having it compromised. The issue with asymmetric is that it is about 1000 times slower than symmetric encryption which makes it impractical when trying to encrypt large amounts of data. Also to get the same security strength as symmetric, asymmetric must use strong a stronger key than symmetric.