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Symmetric key algorithms, algorithms for cryptography, uses the same cryptographic keys for encryption of plaintext and decryption of ciphertext. These keys are generated, depending on cryptographic algorithms based on mathematical problems to produce one-way functions.Īny person can encrypt a message using the receiver’s public key, but the encrypted files or folders can only be decrypted with the receiver’s private key. Public key cryptography (also known as asymmetric cryptography) uses two types of keys, namely public keys which may be disseminated widely, and private keys which are known only to the owner. In the Microsoft Windows operating systems, EFS uses a combination of public key cryptography and symmetric key cryptography to make decrypting the encrypted files or folders extremely difficult without the correct key.

Windows EFS can help users avoid the above risk easily. However, this barrier can be easily avoided if an attacker gains physical access to users’ computers. Without EFS, when operating system is running, access to files or folders goes through OS-controlled user authentication and access control lists. To be more specific, it ensures that any files or folders is stored in encrypted form and decrypted only by an individual user and an authorized recovery agent. How does it work? The technology works together with NTFS permissions to grant and refuse computers access to files and folders in some Windows operating systems.

What is EFS? Short for Encrypting File System, EFS is introduced as a transparent public key encryption for the version 3.0 of Windows NTFS (New Technology File System).

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