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The Magic Math of Encryption | Contrary

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Discretion is an increasingly difficult thing to come by. We have traded the speed and convenience of information transfer for risk of its exposure as we have moved the entire contents of our lives online. The battle for privacy in a digital world is like the battle against entropy in the physical world. It’s constant. Just as the computer, a one-time military-grade technology, has descended into the laps and pockets of every person, so too has cryptography. Once, systems of encrypting information were considered top government secrets. Now, they are the invisible protocols we interact with any time we open a web browser, place a phone call, or connect to a WiFi network. The strength of cryptographic algorithms, and the protection they offer for securing individual liberty against everything from online attackers to meddling governments, has raised the status of this field from an esoteric branch of computer science to a foundational requirement for a free society. Entirely new systems

Discretion is an increasingly difficult thing to come by. We have traded the speed and convenience of information transfer for risk of its exposure as we have moved the entire contents of our lives online. The battle for privacy in a digital world is like the battle against entropy in the physical world. It’s constant. Just as the computer, a one-time military-grade technology, has descended into the laps and pockets of every person, so too has cryptography. Once, systems of encrypting information were considered top government secrets. Now, they are the invisible protocols we interact with an

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