Standardization of Software-Based Encryption Algorithms Comes with a Power

AES algorithm is the standard used by most of the developers use today. It is standardized by U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). It is great to see an algorithm that is proven to be secure and used worldwide. The thing is, however, since cryptography caries an essential role on security in general, it is intriguing to see that United States has managed to get a great role in it. Because they are the country that popularized their algorithm worldwide, it also means that they can most likely break and read any message encrypted with it.

In theory, AES is secure according to the NSA, U.S. Security Agency. However, it is almost certain that they can break any message encrypted with it. They also have a history with the previous encryption standard, namely DES. The founder of DES is Horst Feistel. He was interfered with NSA several times while he was working on the new encryption standard. Because NSA does not want to break all ciphers, but at least most of them, they closely monitored the invention of computerized cryptography. At the time, computers with transistors were coming common. Brands like IBM were starting to sell business computers. Businesses with computers started looking for an encryption algorithm so they could communicate securely. So the standardization of an encryption algorithm happened at that time. The algorithm was determined to be the DES algorithm. The thing is, DES was actually one of the algorithms that was really secure. However, at the time of standardization, the NSA decided to limit the key length to something much smaller than what the algorithm was capable of. They probably do this to be able to intercept messages encrypted with DES.

Considering that the U.S. is a major contributor to the cryptography standards used, they certainly have an advantage in critical national situations. Cryptography has had a huge impact since its inception. We owe a lot of our security to it. People cannot connect to our Wi-Fi network because of encryption. Cryptography also protects our credentials when we log into a Web site. When a national power owns the algorithms used in this process, that can mean a lot of power. I’m comfortable with the current state of cryptography. The average citizen can’t see that our important communications are encrypted with standardized algorithms. I don’t care if national security agencies can read the cryptography I create. Because they’re not going to go through that trouble for an ordinary citizen like me. They will keep it for desperate times like war.