What Is “Military-Grade Encryption”?

Many companies tout ;military-grade encryption; to protect your data. If it7;s good enough for the military, it must be the best2;right? Well, kind of. ;Military-grade encryption; is more of a marketing term that doesn7;t have a precise meaning.

Encryption Basics

Let7;s start with the basics. Encryption is, essentially, a way to take information and scramble it, so it looks like gibberish. You can then decrypt that encrypted information2;but only if you know how. The method of encrypting and decrypting is known as a ;cipher,; and it usually relies on a piece of information known as a ;key.;

For example, when you visit a website encrypted with HTTPS and sign in with a password or provide a credit card number, that private data is sent over the internet in a scrambled (encrypted) form. Only your computer and the website you7;re communicating with can understand it, which prevents people from snooping on your password or credit card number. When you first connect, your browser and the website perform a ;handshake; and exchange secrets that are used for encryption and decryption of the data.

There are many different encryption algorithms. Some are more secure and harder to crack than others.