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Ahmed Belal
Ahmed Belal

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Symmetric vs Asymmetric Encryption

πŸ”‘ Symmetric vs Asymmetric Encryption

The Perfect Pair for Data Security

Every secure system begins with keys, but how you use them makes all the difference πŸ‘‡

✴️ Symmetric Encryption
β€’ Uses one shared key for both encryption and decryption.
β€’ Fast and efficient β€” great for large amounts of data.
β€’ The challenge: both sides must securely share the same key.
βœ… Examples: AES, DES, 3DES

✴️ Asymmetric Encryption
β€’ Uses two keys: a public key for encryption and a private key for decryption.
β€’ Slower, but perfect for building trust and exchanging secrets safely.
βœ… Examples: RSA, ECC, Diffie-Hellman

πŸ”„ How They Work Together
In real-world systems, we often use asymmetric encryption to securely share a symmetric key,
then use symmetric encryption to handle the actual data because it’s much faster.

That’s exactly how HTTPS and TLS work behind the scenes β€” secure key exchange first, then fast data encryption.

🧠 Simply put:
β€’ Symmetric β†’ one key, fast, but hard to share safely
β€’ Asymmetric β†’ two keys, slower, but enables secure sharing
β€’ Together β†’ speed + security

CyberSecurity #Encryption #CloudSecurity #Networking #TLS #RSA #AES #DevOps #InfoSec #ABCloudOps #AWS

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