40-bit encryption
Key size for symmetric encryption / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dear Wikiwand AI, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:
Can you list the top facts and stats about 40-bit encryption?
Summarize this article for a 10 year old
SHOW ALL QUESTIONS
40-bit encryption refers to a (now broken) key size of forty bits, or five bytes, for symmetric encryption; this represents a relatively low level of security. A forty bit length corresponds to a total of 240 possible keys. Although this is a large number in human terms (about a trillion), it is possible to break this degree of encryption using a moderate amount of computing power in a brute-force attack, i.e., trying out each possible key in turn.