RSA

“Public-key cryptography was invented in 1976 by Whitfield Diffie and Martin Hellman in order to solve the key management problem. In the new system, each person gets a pair of keys, called the public key and the private key. Each person's public key is published while the private key is kept secret.” (6,1.3)

“However, Admiral Bobby Inman claimed that public key cryptography had been discovered at NSA in the mid-1960s.” (3,259)

“Every Egyptian received two names, which were known respectively as the true name and the god name, or the great name and the little names; and while the good or little name was made public, the true or the great name appears to have been carefully concealed. -The Golden Bough,Sir James George Fraze.” (3,258)

Public key itu sendiri ternyata telah digunakan pada zaman dahulu kala. Orang Mesir pada saat itu menggunakan nama kecilnya untuk pergaulan sehari-hari. Sedangkan nama sebenarnya dirahasisakan.

Pada zaman sekarang, public key tidak hanya menggunakan sepasang kunci yang berbeda baik untuk enkripsi maupun deskripsi tetapi dibuat berdasarkan fungsi mathematic daripada subtitusi maupun permutasi. Sehingga public key merupakan terobosan yang sangat revolutioner bagi sejarah kriptograpi.

“RSA Algorithm is a public key encryption algorithm based on exponentiation in modular arithmetic. It is the only algorithm generally accepted as practical and secure for public-key enkripsiion.” (3,655)

“RSA is a public-key cryptosystem for both encryption and authentication; it was invented in 1977 by Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman” (6,2.1)