Whilst you may understand the wider concept of randomness, let’s take a look at randomness in the context of cryptography, including what it is, how it works, and why it’s important.
What Is Randomness?
At its most simple, randomness means unpredictability. This is the kind of thing you’d see when flipping a coin, rolling a dice, or spinning a wheel – you never know where it will land, as there’s no pattern to the results.
Of course, these are all things that need physical input. However, this doesn’t mean randomness cannot be digital – just look at something like online casinos.
When casino enthusiasts in the UK play Starburst slots online they will find that different colored gemstones and the star wild fall onto the reels in a random order. This is because slot games like Starburst are powered by random number generators (RNGs).
RNGs randomly generate numbers, characters, symbols, or whatever the application desires, in a way that is not predetermined or predictable. This ensures that the results of things like online casino games are purely based on luck, therefore making for an immersive and fair digital experience.
This same technology can also be used in a wide range of other applications, from password generation to cryptography.
What Are The Types of Cryptography?
Whilst there are numerous types of cryptography out there, they can be roughly split into three distinct categories – symmetric, asymmetric, and hash function. As defined by Techopedia, symmetric encryption uses a singular secret encryption key to encode and decode electronic data. For this reason, it is also known as secret key cryptography.
Otherwise known as public key cryptography, asymmetric encryption uses two keys. The first key is the public key, which is used to encrypt the message. The second key is a secret key, which is mathematically related to the first, and used to decrypt the message. As the pattern between the two cannot be guessed without knowing them, it can be reused time and time again.
Hash functions use the process of hashing. As explained by Tech Target, this describes transforming a key into another value, known as a hash value. The hash value and digital signature are provided to the receiver, who can use the same hash function to compare the results, and therefore maintain data integrity during the encryption and decryption process.
Randomness in Cryptography
As you can see, cryptography requires a key or seed algorithm. These must be unpredictable, as this ensures the security of the encrypted data. With this in mind, RNGs are used to generate the secret and public keys, as well as elements of the seed algorithms for the hash functions, to bolster the indeterminability of the process.
In addition, many cryptographic processes also require authentication for the parties involved in the data transaction. RNGs can be used to one-time generate IDs, tokens, and multi-factor authentication passcodes to make the security of the process more secure.
Overall, RNGs and the concept of randomness are essential to cryptography, even if they don’t get the press they deserve. Randomness not only serves as the core of the encryption and decryption processes but also provides further security protocols to ensure only authorized personnel can access the data and the keys.
