Some might be surprised when they hear that encryptions are used in emails. But, when you think about it deeply, it all makes sense since protection of privacy is essential in emails. According to the Microsoft Office website, “Encrypting an e-mail message in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 protects the privacy of the message by converting it from (readable) plaintext into (scrambled) ciphertext. Only the recipient who has the private key that matches the public key used to encrypt the message can decipher the message for reading. Any recipient without the corresponding private key would see only garbled text.”
However, manual encryption of emails is considered to be a time consuming and complicated process. So, often times, emails used in corporations or government agencies are encrypted automatically for convenience. Then.. what benefits does one gain by encrypting emails? Obviously, as I mentioned in the beginning of this post, major benefit gained by encryptions of email is that it ensures privacy. In a society where knowledge equals power, it is extremely important to protect information whether it is one’s personal informations or a corporation’s confidential informations.
In my next post, I will be writing about other encryptions that are used in computer world.
The Wonderful World of Algorithms 