How is public-key encryption different from traditional encryption?
Public-key encryption is used by SSL to encrypt and decrypt transmitted data. Unlike secret-key encryption systems, a public-key system uses pairs of keys (key pairs). One key, called the public-key, is used to encrypt messages, while the other, called the private-key, is used to decrypt messages. The two keys are large numbers that are related mathematically in such a way that it takes a very long time to calculate the private-key from the public-key. DiscoveryEducation.com has registered it’s public-key with Verisign, Inc. When you want to send DiscoveryEducation.com an encrypted message, your browser must look up our public-key in a directory maintained by Verisign. The browser then uses DiscoveryEducation.com’s public-key to encrypt the message, and send us the encrypted message. Only our private-key can decrypt the message sent from you. Because public-key encryption is much slower than secret-key encryption, SSL uses it only when your browser first connects to the DiscoveryEducat
