Scott Nevil is an experienced writer and editor with a demonstrated history of publishing content for Investopedia. He goes in-depth to create informative and actionable content around monetary policy ...

Hashing is a one-way cryptographic function while encryption is designed to work both ways. Encryption algorithms take input and a secret key and generate a random looking output called a ciphertext.

For the math-phobic out there, don't let the word scare you. An "algorithm" is nothing more than a set of instructions, just like a recipe or how-to book. And the Internet relies on many, many ...