Cryptography Podcast: Mastering Multi-Encryption Techniques 🔐

Multiple encryption is the process of encrypting an already encrypted message one or more times, either using the same or a different algorithm. It is also known as cascade encryption, cascade ciphering, multiple encryption, and superencipherment. Superencryption refers to the outer-level encryption of a multiple encryption. A hybrid cryptosystem is one which combines the convenience of a public-key cryptosystem with the efficiency of a symmetric-key cryptosystem. A hybrid cryptosystem can be constructed using any two separate cryptosystems: first, a key encapsulation scheme, which is a public-key cryptosystem, and second a data encapsulation scheme, which is a symmetric-key cryptosystem. Perhaps the most commonly used hybrid cryptosystems are the OpenPGP (RFC 4880) file format and the PKCS #7 (RFC 2315) file format, both used by many different systems. Multiple encryption (Cascade Ciphers) reduces the consequences in the case that our favorite cipher is already broken and is continuously exposing our data without our knowledge. When a cipher is broken (something we will not know), the use of other ciphers may represent the only security in the system. Since we cannot scientifically prove that any particular cipher is strong, the question is not whether subsequent ciphers are strong, but instead, what would make us believe that any particular cipher is so strong as to need no added protection. The encryption client Spot-On brought multi-encryption with(in) the Echo-protocol forward.