Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) 197: Advanced Encryption Standard

Tags: 2000s AES Encryption Standards NIST

Authors: NIST

Published: November 2001

URL: https://web.archive.org/web/20030406010431/http://www.csrc.nist.gov/publications/fips/fips197/fips-197.pdf

Abstract: The Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), officially published on November 26, 2001, provides a Computer Security Standard (Cryptography), for use by Federal departments and agencies when an agency determines that sensitive (unclassified) information requires cryptographic protection. The standard may also be used and adopted by non-Federal Government organizations. The AES specifies Federal Information Process Standards’ (FIPS’) approved cryptographic algorithm that can be used to protect electronic data. The AES algorithm is a symmetric block cipher that can encrypt (encipher) and decrypt (decipher) information. Encryption converts data to an unintelligible form, ciphertext; decrypting the ciphertext converts the data back into its original form. The AES algorithm is capable of using cryptographic keys of 128, 192, and 256 bits to encrypt and decrypt data in blocks of 128 buts.