Glossary 341
Data Encryption Standard
See DES.
decryption
The inverse (reverse) of encryption. The
process by which the ciphertext is
converted into plaintext.
DER
Distinguished Encoding Rules. A subset
of BER which gives a unique encoding to
each ASN.1 value.
DES
Data Encryption Standard. A block
cipher developed by IBM and the U.S.
government in the 1970's as an official
standard. See also block cipher.
dictionary attack
A brute force attack that tries passwords
and/or keys from a precompiled list of
values. This is often done as a pre-
computation attack.
Diffie-Hellman key exchange
A key exchange protocol allowing the
participants to agree on a key over an
insecure channel.
digest
Commonly used to refer to the output of
a hash function. For example, a message
digest refers to the hash of a message.
digital signature
The encryption of a message digest with
a private key.
distributed key
A key that is split up into many parts
and shared (distributed) among
different participants. See also secret
sharing.
DMS
Defense Messaging Service.
DOD
Department of Defense.
DSA
Digital Signature Algorithm. DSA is a
public-key method based on the discrete
logarithm problem.
DSS
Digital Signature Standard. DSA is the
Digital Signature Standard.
EAR
Export Administration Regulations.
ECAES
Elliptic Curve Authenticated Encryption
Scheme.
ECC
Elliptic Curve Cryptosystem. A public-
key cryptosystem based on the
properties of elliptic curves.
ECDH
Elliptic Curve Diffie-Hellman key
agreement.
ECDL
See elliptic curve discrete logarithm.
