Question

If the contents of encrypted file1.nc and encrypted file3.nc are different, but the original file1 and file3 are the same, and you used the same password and algorithm when encrypting both, what might explain the difference?

Answer 1

Answer:

The Difference is because of the salt added to the password before hashing or encrypting it.

Explanation:

The Difference is because of the salt added to the password before hashing or encrypting it.

Salts are random data used to mention uniqueness. Suppose if two users have same password for the same system. By adding Salt to the password makes it unique in the crypto system. Its a added security layer which can safeguard the passwords or hashed data in the keystore or storage.

Salt can be prepended to the password or appended to the password.

Suppose the password is “stuti” then its SHA256 HASH value is “4beb1eb6f438495eede7b14ac0d2b955636a49412cd4eb5714341f5716144954”

So, if we add a salt with random string brainlysalttest then its SHA256 HASH value is “5429e85778f1b9f493da637848f253dedf3edbfbb72782d43eb7337cee45ab0c”

If we append the salt brainlytestsalt to the same password and hash it using SHA256 then its hash value is : “3919b677d80ae0da2b58f70b464f6492670ccffee78cf52972c6983995ed8f52”

So clearly Salting to the password and Hashing the salted password will make the difference and also unique.