RSA Encryption

Definition - What does RSA Encryption mean?

RSA encryption is a public-key encryption technology developed by RSA Data Security. The RSA algorithm is based on the difficulty in factoring very large numbers. Based on this principle, the RSA encryption algorithm uses prime factorization as the trap door for encryption. Deducing an RSA key, therefore, takes a huge amount of time and processing power. RSA is the standard encryption method for important data, especially data that's transmitted over the Internet.

RSA stands for the creators of the technique, Rivest, Shamir and Adelman.

Techopedia explains RSA Encryption

RSA encryption is a public key encryption technology developed by RSA Data Security, which licenses the algorithm technologies and also sells the development kits. RSA is built into many common software products, including Microsoft's Internet Explorer.

A person using RSA encryption finds the product of two large prime numbers, which are kept confidential. With additional mathematical operations, two sets of numbers - public and private keys - are developed. Once the public and private keys are derived, the large numbers can be discarded.

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