Talk:Symmetric-key algorithm

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 24 August 2021 and 11 December 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): CodeBreakNight.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 10:35, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Untitled
Re: Statement "The symmetric-key algorithms can't be used for authentication or non-repudiation purposes." Isn't authentication possible, using a KDC?

Re: authentication is possible, but you need a trusted channel first.. which involves asymmetric cryto... Sounds weird anyway.

Quite a few sections of this document are written in broken or poor English. Someone needs to fix this! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.102.71.38 (talk) 04:18, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Word usage
In your section marked "speed" I find the following sentence:

"In practice, this means that a quality asymmetric key algorithm is hundreds or thousands of times slower than a quality symmetric key algorithm."

The word "quality" unmodified has no meaning in this sentence. It is like saying "the plane was flying at an altitude." If it is off the ground, it has altitude, but, unmodified, gives no information on how far off the ground. High altitude? Low altitude? I believe you are trying to say "high quality." If this is so, may I suggest saying so? Kjdamrau 06:42, 7 July 2007 (UTC)Ken Damrau


 * Quality is often used by itself in colloquial English and some journalistic writing to mean (of) good quality. The word good would probably be better here. Koro Neil (talk) 01:34, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

Content yet lacking depth
Seems as much on asymmetric as on symmetric encryption.

Why not move description of other concepts to the respective article or - if comparing - to a higher level, eg to an article on crypto systems in general.

And, sorry to say this, substance is yet lacking.

Whoever has a few serious math books at hand and an understanding of the taxonomy ... thanks. 14 Sep 2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.58.17.179 (talk) 20:17, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

On the proposed merger with symmetric key management
Oppose merger Key management is a very large, hard to adequately cover, easy to get wrong (both in execution and in description), topic. It simply can't be adequately handled as a sub section of this article, and to try will result in lowered quality of this article, which already needs improvement. So, for both content and for reasons of WP presentation of that content, this merger is not a good idea. ww (talk) 07:06, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Oppose merger This page is basically an overview over different topics on symmetric key algorithms. To keep this overview readable it is a good idea to keep the details on each of these topics in separate articles. 62.203.28.106 (talk) 10:03, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Trivially Related? Wording?
Is the phrase a term of art or a conventional term? If not, it seems to me it should be changed to "closely related". Trivialy related would seem to me to suggest the relationship exists but it is small or insignificant, trivial. This seems exactly opposite to what the reality is- the relationship is identical or the keys differ by a small relatively insignificant transformation, a trivial difference.

Thoughts? --Δζ (talk) 02:32, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
 * The term "trivial" is used in mathematics to express that something is easy (see Trivial_(mathematics)).85.3.72.132 (talk) 07:11, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * It should be removed. If the twp keys aren't identical it isn't symmetric. If they are different they are asymmetric. If the difference is trivial, then it may just be a poorly chosen key pair.

Kernel.package (talk) 00:02, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Introduction weak
The first two sentences could easily be merged/joined, as they convey similar information.

Possible conflict of interest issue
The line, "It is possible to encrypt without using any fixed algorithm. Non-Algorithmic Encryption[5]" contains a link to a page which offers products for sale. The phrase "Non-Algorithmic Encryption" seems to me to be a contradiction in terms and may possibly be a trademark belonging to a Swedish company called TRNG98. JLKrause (talk) 03:41, 26 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Moreover, there is a lack of secondary sources WP:OR. Typically, encryption schemes on Wikipedia should have been published (i.e. peer reviewed) and analyzed. 05:42, 26 July 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:1205:C6BB:6880:A0CE:5BE0:C90E:6766 (talk)

removed "well-respected" from "Implementations"
RC4 is mentioned and is not "well-respected" nowadays! has been known to be insecure for _years_. source: ivan ristic, bulletproof SSL, feistyduck.com. from a historic point of view RC4 deserves respect for sure - but any statement to that regard would have to be specific enough not to lead readers to think RC4 is still considered secure as of today. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.209.180.8 (talk) 14:17, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Merging and redirecting Reciprocal cipher
I am BOLDly implementing the proposed merge of Reciprocal cipher into this page (Symmetric-key algorithm) from January 2012, having seen no objection under WP:MERGECLOSE. Please feel free to reopen discussion on this if you think that's needed. Thanks, L235 (t / c / ping in reply ) 06:11, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Done. L235 (t / c / ping in reply ) 06:17, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

Telegramy Petridahura1 (talk) 23:14, 16 October 2021 (UTC)

Securing Local Data
While the article on asymmetric or public key cryptography lays an emphasis on securing communication channels, here, you also talk about sharing keys. I am missing information which allows to classify and qualify encryption systems for use on locally stored data. Currently there is no easy way to deduce that symmetric algorithms should be preferable in such a context. TIA --Psycho Chicken (talk) 05:27, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Use of let
''Let, the character is “T”. Step 4: Let 1000 as divisor. I suspect English is not the writer's first language. Koro Neil (talk) 01:38, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

One-time pad?
Isn't a one-time pad a symmetric cipher? If so it isn't mentioned here. RichardAlexanderHall (talk) 16:49, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Technically it is -- the keys on both sides are the same, however it is not really a practical example, since the shared secret is very large. Do you think it makes sense to use it as an example? Namnatulco (talk) 14:08, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

About history and differences between algorithm and cryptography
I have a couple of sources that would give more of the history/evolution of symmetric-key cryptography. Do you think that would fit here? If not, where do you think it could go? I was wondering because symmetric-key cryptography (I believe) redirects to here.CodeBreakNight (talk) 17:14, 2 December 2021 (UTC)