md5

add a note User Contributed Notes

tszming at gmail dot com
31-Oct-2006 12:47


The following method, is about 3x faster than md5('apple');



$hash = bin2hex( md5('apple', true) ) ;

squeegee
11-Oct-2006 01:01


Regarding the md5_base64 function posted below, since the encoded string will never be longer than 64 characters (the maximum length of a base64 encoded line), and the fact that base64 strings only insert the '=' pad character at the end of an encoded line, instead of using preg_replace, you can just use rtrim.



$myhash=rtrim(base64_encode(pack("H*",md5($data))),"=");



This will result in a string of 22 characters, suitable for inserting in mysql or whatever. Also, if you are testing against the string in a query in mysql, make sure to use the keyword BINARY, as case matters.



The reason for the function in the first place (for me):

If you're currently using an md5 hash for a unique index, this will save at least 20 bytes for every record on disk (index + data) and 10 bytes in memory. If you have millions of rows, that can really add up (100 million rows would require about 1 less gigabyte of memory for your key_buffer_size variable in mysql).

maximius at gmail dot com
09-Oct-2006 01:38


This is just something I made while looking into MD5 and SHA-1, how they can be exploited, and whatnot.



   /**

    * crypto - Generates a hash made up of 40 letters and digits

    * by passing a source variable through a custom algorithm.

    * First it determines the CRC32, customizable crypt, and MD5

    * hashes for the source variable, and implodes them into one

    * string. This string can be seperated by another customizable

    * salt variable. Finally the SHA-1 hash of the original source

    * variable is calculated, with the imploded string appended

    * to the end of the source variable.

    */

   function crypto($source){

        $salt[0] = "something  here!";   // Limit this to 16 characters

        $salt[1] = "abcd";             // Limit this to 8 characters

        $crypt[0] = crc32($source);

        $crypt[1] = crypt($source, $salt[0]);

        $crypt[2] = md5($source);

        $crypt = implode($salt[1], $crypt);

        return sha1($source.$crypt);

    }



It works really well if you need a secure, custom hashing function. I hope it works for whatever you use it for!

seth at interwebforce dot com
07-Oct-2006 02:36


I made this simple script to beat MD5 crackers and it worked, so have fun. Its simple and effective.



<?php

$pass = str_split("mypassword");

foreach ($pass as $hashpass) {

$majorsalt .= md5($hashpass);

}

$corehash = md5($majorsalt);

echo $corehash;

?> 



Tested against rednoise and gdata md5 crackers.

coryostrudel at godcomplex dot com
17-May-2006 08:45


If you are storing your passwords with and MD5 hash and are worried about collisions, an approach I have used was to store two passwords for the user.



credentials

----------

userName

password

passwordChk



Where:

$input - users input password

$key - a site based key stored out of public folders



password = MD5($key.strrev($input))

passwordChk = MD5($input{0}.substr($input,(floor(strlen($input))/2),strlen))



This will stored the users password in the database as an MD5 hash of the string reversed plus a site based key stored out of public folders.



It also stores a check value to check that the input is the true input and not a colliding value.  The check takes the first character appends a substring of the input taking the last half of the input string and creates and MD5.



I think this is pretty secure.  It takes a modified salt & pepper approach, and follows up with a check on the original input to make sure it is not a colliding value, while also not storing the original password in plain text.

marzetti dot marco at NOSPAM dot gmail dot com
16-May-2006 06:12


The complement of raw2hex



<?php



function hex2raw( $str ){

  $chunks = str_split($str, 2);

  for( $i = 0; $i < sizeof($chunks); $i++ ) {

        $op .= chr( hexdec( $chunks[$i] ) );

    }

    return $op;

}



?>

mina86 at projektcode dot org
25-Jan-2006 04:01


Re: Andrew Nelless



I believe that HMAC was designed for some reason. I believe the reason was that <?php hmac_md5($salt, $password); ?> is more secure then <?php md5($salt . $password); ?>



Re: nathan at nathanbolender dot com



The 'Salt & Pepper Encrypter' is no more secure then standard sha1() function. It only adds some random chars to the hash but does nothing with the password's hash. In particular, its enought to remove 32 or 40 characters (depending on the length of the whole hash - 74 or 82 characters acordingly) from the hash starting with the character at position stored at the end of hash (last two digits). We get a 42-char long string which first 40 characters are SHA-1 of the password.

rick.gaither
21-Dec-2005 01:14


This is a nifty function to help in securing your web-forms. 



If no argument is passed the function will return an encrypted hex code representing the second it was called. If the same hex code is passed to the function it will return the number of seconds that have elapsed. The php script can then check the time between accessing the web-page and submitting the POST. This thwarts script ran web-form submissions. The program can verify a suitable period has elapsed for expected manual entries. The time check can be from 1 second to about 17 hours.



The function requires the latest PEAR Blowfish Encryption module.



This would go in the form:

<?php  print "<input type='hidden' value='" . FormTimer() . "' name='FormCode'>";  ?>



This would go in the main php (post) script:

<?php

$seconds = FormTimer($_POST['FormCode']);

if (($seconds < 10) || ($seconds > 1900)) { die "Your entry time took less than 10 seconds or more than 30 minutes"; }

?>



Function...

<?php

function FormTimer($CodeID="") {



    require ('Blowfish.php');

    require ('Blowfish/DefaultKey.php');



    $key = "Secret^Word";

    $bf = new Crypt_Blowfish($key); 

     $current = substr(sprintf("%d", (time()+1)),-8);



    if (!$CodeID) { return bin2hex($bf->encrypt($current)); } 



    $len = strlen($CodeID); $cValue = -1; 

    for ($i=0;$i<$len;$i+=2) $Crypt.=chr(hexdec(substr($CodeID,$i,2)));



    if ($Crypt) {

        $time_called = $bf->decrypt($Crypt); 

        if ($time_called) { $cValue = (intval($current) - intval($time_called)); }

    }

    return $cValue;

}

?>

Andrew Nelless ( anelless _ gmail _com )
18-Dec-2005 02:04


"mina86 at tlen dot pl"'s (19-Sept-05) HMAC-MD5 implementation is correct but his example usage provides little practical advantage over the simple concatenation and hash approach to salting.



$hash = md5($salt . $password);



On the other hand, a good use for a MAC (with a server side private key) would be to store one in the users cookie in order to verify that cookie's (or parts of them) you issue haven't been changed manually (or for that matter, by any other website (maybe via a XSS browser exploit?), MITM attack or evil proxy).



Such a trick allows you to put mildly critical data about a user, that you don't want changed by anyone but you, in their cookie rather than in your database. This could have advantages (openness, not needing to store user email addresses at the server side once they have been verified by email, even do away with the need to store data about a poster in a server side database altogether but still being able to allow these almost anonymous posters to come along and edit their submissions with confidence) and be rather entertaining (users trying to crack their cookie code to elevate their stats and/or permissions).



This is like issueing a passport. The traveller can see all of it,  get it stamped (~customise parts of it) but can also invalidate it and have it revoked. It can also save on expensive and time consuming nationality/immigration checks (~using the database) at the airport (~the server side).

Jon Watte
03-Dec-2005 12:11


Scrambling the md5 adds no security, because it only adds obscurity. md5 is a reasonably strong hash function, although it's recently been shown to be weaker than previously thought. If hashing your password with md5 isn't good enough for you, then you should use a stronger hash like Tiger instead -- not apply amateurish obfuscation that only serves to give you a false sense of security.



I don't know of an implementation of Tiger for PHP, but the algorithm is pretty simple (and secure) so you could probably write it in plain PHP code.

karig at karig dot net
30-Nov-2005 10:38


Scramble your hashes.



If you are worried about whether these hash functions are "good enough" for security and are tempted to combine hash functions to try to increase security, but you know that combining hashes might be counterproductive, then why not use md5() to get your hash string, then use a custom scramble function to rearrange the digits in that hash string?



Use this scramble function whenever a user is logging in: Encrypt the password with md5(), then with your scramble function, and compare the result with the pre-encrypted password stored on your server for that user.



Here is an example (you might decide to scramble the digits in a different order):



<?php

function scramble($p) {

    // Assumes that $p is going to be 32 characters long



    $q = $p{13} . $p{30} . $p{5} . $p{17} . $p{23} . $p{0}

        . $p{28} . $p{4} . $p{18} . $p{25} . $p{6} . $p{20}

        . $p{14} . $p{9} . $p{31} . $p{11} . $p{24} . $p{29}

        . $p{10} . $p{3} . $p{15} . $p{26} . $p{8} . $p{12}

        . $p{21} . $p{27} . $p{1} . $p{16} . $p{22} . $p{7}

        . $p{19} . $p{2};

    return $q;

}



$p = $_POST['password'];

// If the password is blank or too short, do something here.



$p = scramble(md5($p));

// Now set $s = scrambled password stored on server.

// If $p == $s then we have a match.

?>



You could even make the scramble function more elaborate by repeating certain arbitrary characters an arbitrary number of times, e.g., having scramble() insert $p(19) into $q three or four times, thus producing a string longer than 32 characters.

nathan at nathanbolender dot com
17-Oct-2005 03:31


If you're a security freak you might want to take a look at the 2 functions I have posted at http://code.nathanbolender.com/PHP/salt_pepper/ . It uses a hardcoded "key" and hashes it one of 2 ways, so you are always left with a random 'hash' to store in your database. The other function will check the hash against the original string to make sure that it is correct. If you want to see an example of the debug output you can at http://code.nathanbolender.com/PHP/salt/ . Note that on that page the "key" is random only to demonstrate the possibility for so much variations.



I know that a simple md5() would normally be enough, but I came up with this and I wanted to share it.

mina86 at tlen dot pl
20-Sep-2005 04:41


It seems that the best solution would be to use HMAC-MD5. An implementation of HMAC-SHA1 was posted by mark on 30-Jan-2004 02:28 as a user comment to sha1() function (-> http://php.net/manual/function.sha1.php#39492). Here's how it would look like (some other optimizations/modifications are included as well):



<?php

// Calculate HMAC according to RFC2104

// http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2104.txt

function hmac($key, $data, $hash = 'md5', $blocksize = 64) {

  if (strlen($key)>$blocksize) {

    $key = pack('H*', $hash($key));

  }

  $key  = str_pad($key, $blocksize, chr(0));

  $ipad = str_repeat(chr(0x36), $blocksize);

  $opad = str_repeat(chr(0x5c), $blocksize);

  return $hash(($key^$opad) . pack('H*', $hash(($key^$ipad) . $data)));

}



// Remember to initialize MT (using mt_srand() ) if required

function pw_encode($password) {

  $seed = substr('00' . dechex(mt_rand()), -3) .

    substr('00' . dechex(mt_rand()), -3) .

    substr('0' . dechex(mt_rand()), -2);

  return hmac($seed, $password, 'md5', 64) . $seed;

}



function pw_check($password, $stored_value) {

  $seed = substr($stored_value, 32, 8);

  return hmac($seed, $password, 'md5', 64) . $seed==$stored_value;

}



// Test

$password = 'foobar';

$encoded  = pw_encode($password);

$result   = pw_check ($password, $encoded) ? 'true' : 'false';

echo<<<END

password: $password

encoded : $encoded

rsult   : $result



END;

?>

eric at opelousas dot org
01-Aug-2005 05:57


Setting raw_output to TRUE has the same effect using pack('H*', md5($string)) in php 4 



pack( 'H*' , md5( $string) ) ) == md5($string, TRUE)

Helpful Harry
01-Jul-2005 02:29


check out these functions to fake a sha1 entry using md5.  Very, very secure if attackers get your password file...

also, it encrypts differently for the same string, every time



function pw_encode($password)

{

   for ($i = 1; $i <= 8; $i++)

   $seed .= substr('0123456789abcdef', rand(0,15), 1);

   return md5($seed.$password).$seed;

}

function pw_check($password,$stored_value)

{

   $stored_seed = substr($stored_value,32,8);

   if (md5($stored_seed.$password).$stored_seed == $stored_value)

      return TRUE;

   else

      return FALSE;

}

tommiboy
04-May-2005 03:32


Regarding those many posts about MD5 and this-or-that hash function being "broken" or insecure because it has collisions, please note the following:

1. Every hash function has collisions, that is what hash functions are made for. MD5, as an example, turns N bits of input into 128 bits of output. Obviously, whenever N > 128 bits, then there MUST be collisions. This does not mean the function is broken, it means that the function does EXACTLY what you want it to do - it makes a secret unrecoverable.

The important thing about "secure" hash functions is that it is hard to calculate an input that will produce a certain output (e.g. the same output as another user's password). It is impossible to reconstruct a password from a hash if the password has more than 128 bits since several passwords necessarily map to the same hash. No matter which supercomputers you use, you have a set of equations with several unknowns. It is possible to find SOME password that produces a valid hash, though.

For every reasonable scenario, however, MD5 will do just fine. If you are concerned, store the password length as well.

2. Chaining the hash function means 128 bits of input producing 128 bits of output, this does not make sense, really. In fact, you greatly increase the likelihood of finding SOME password that produces the same double-hash.

3. Chaining MD5 with SHA makes little sense, too, as you feed 128 bits into a function that returns 256 bits. So the information that you keep around is 50% redundant. Security is in no way enhanced.

4. You can add "salt", i.e. a constant or variable string (for example calculated from the user id) that is concatenated to the input of the hash function, but that does not really make things a lot better. It does make a dictionary attack against a stolen password database harder, if nothing else.

5. Concerns about this-or-that hash being not good enough are rather silly since there are a lot of other ways which are by several orders of magnitude cheaper and easier to break into your system. It is not likely that any sane person will attempt to find collisions of a hash function to break into one single account. Users are only too happy to give out their password to "the administator who must verify that their password is correct".

6. What happens if two users accidentially choose passwords that have a hash collision? First, this will probably never happen, and second, if it does happen, then there is not much harm. Two users can have the same password and none of them will ever notice.

terry _at_ scribendi_com
29-Apr-2005 10:39


Do not use the hex strings returned by md5() as a key for MCrypt 256-bit encryption.  Hex characters only represent four bits each, so when you take 32 hex characters, you are only really using a 128-bit key, not a 256-bit one.  



Using an alphanumeric key generator [A-Za-z0-9] will also only provide a 192-bit key in 32 characters.



Two different MD5s concatenated in raw binary form, or mcrypt_create_iv(32,MCRYPT_DEV_RANDOM) will give you a true 256-bit key string.

gigabyte0 at NOSPAM dot gmail dot com
07-Mar-2005 03:22


I would think that this would create a slightly mode secure hash by using this:



<?php

function hash($text){

$hashtext = "string";

return md5($text.$hashtext)

}

?>



If you can keep the $hashtext secure.

Anonymous
20-Feb-2005 08:06


In response to the person who suggested concatenation of hashes, I believe that the hashing of a hash would be a better option.



$str = "secret";

$doublehash = sha1(md5($str));

ian at ianalbert dot com
17-Feb-2005 04:41


Concatenating two different hashes will decrease security.  Instead of an attacker having to crack one hash algorithm they now have the option of cracking either.  It's like a crime scene having one clue or several clues.  In security simplicity is usually the better approach.

functionifelse at gmail dot com
10-Dec-2004 12:34


Here is a function to convert raw md5 to hex md5:

<?

function raw2hex($s){

  for($i = 0; $i < strlen($s); $i++){

    $op .= str_pad(dechex(ord($s[$i])),2,"0",STR_PAD_LEFT);

  }

  return $op;

}

?>

Where $s is the raw md5 input.

John S.
04-Dec-2004 03:42


If you want to replicate CPAN Digest::MD5's function md5_base64 in PHP, use this code:





<?php





function md5_base64 ( $data )


{


    return preg_replace('/=+$/','',base64_encode(pack('H*',md5($data))));


}





?>

Alexander Valyalkin
01-Jul-2004 04:41


Below is MD5-based block cypher (MDC-like), which works in 128bit CFB mode. It is very useful to encrypt secret data before transfer it over the network.

$iv_len - initialization vector's length.

0 <= $iv_len <= 512



<?php



function get_rnd_iv($iv_len)

{

    $iv = '';

    while ($iv_len-- > 0) {

        $iv .= chr(mt_rand() & 0xff);

    }

    return $iv;

}



function md5_encrypt($plain_text, $password, $iv_len = 16)

{

    $plain_text .= "\x13";

    $n = strlen($plain_text);

    if ($n % 16) $plain_text .= str_repeat("\0", 16 - ($n % 16));

    $i = 0;

    $enc_text = get_rnd_iv($iv_len);

    $iv = substr($password ^ $enc_text, 0, 512);

    while ($i < $n) {

        $block = substr($plain_text, $i, 16) ^ pack('H*', md5($iv));

        $enc_text .= $block;

        $iv = substr($block . $iv, 0, 512) ^ $password;

        $i += 16;

    }

    return base64_encode($enc_text);

}



function md5_decrypt($enc_text, $password, $iv_len = 16)

{

    $enc_text = base64_decode($enc_text);

    $n = strlen($enc_text);

    $i = $iv_len;

    $plain_text = '';

    $iv = substr($password ^ substr($enc_text, 0, $iv_len), 0, 512);

    while ($i < $n) {

        $block = substr($enc_text, $i, 16);

        $plain_text .= $block ^ pack('H*', md5($iv));

        $iv = substr($block . $iv, 0, 512) ^ $password;

        $i += 16;

    }

    return preg_replace('/\\x13\\x00*$/', '', $plain_text);

}



/******************************************/

$plain_text = 'very secret string';

$password = 'very secret password';

echo "plain text is: [${plain_text}]<br />\n";

echo "password is: [${password}]<br />\n";



$enc_text = md5_encrypt($plain_text, $password);

echo "encrypted text is: [${enc_text}]<br />\n";



$plain_text2 = md5_decrypt($enc_text, $password);

echo "decrypted text is: [${plain_text2}]<br />\n";



?>

mina86 at tlen dot pl
27-Feb-2004 03:14


In respons to Emin Sadykhov at 14-Oct-2003 12:47:

The function presented by Emin isn't IMO simple, simpler is:

<?php

if (!function_exists('is_md5')) {

  function is_md5($var) {

    return preg_match('/^[A-Fa-f0-9]{32}$/',$var);

  }

}

?>

Morover (as I proved somewhere else) it's faster 'cuz preg_match() is faster then ereg()

brian_bisaillon at rogers dot com
26-Feb-2004 12:17


Source code to create SSHA passwords...



public function HashPassword($password)

{

  mt_srand((double)microtime()*1000000);

  $salt = mhash_keygen_s2k(MHASH_SHA1, $password, substr(pack('h*', md5(mt_rand())), 0, 8), 4);

  $hash = "{SSHA}".base64_encode(mhash(MHASH_SHA1, $password.$salt).$salt);

  return $hash;

}



Source code to validate SSHA passwords...



public function ValidatePassword($password, $hash)

{

  $hash = base64_decode(substr($hash, 6));

  $original_hash = substr($hash, 0, 20);

  $salt = substr($hash, 20);

  $new_hash = mhash(MHASH_SHA1, $password . $salt);

   if (strcmp($original_hash, $new_hash) == 0)

     ... do something because your password is valid ...

  else

    echo 'Unauthorized: Authorization has been refused for the credentials you provided. Please login with a valid username and password.';

    ... be sure to clear your session data ...

}



Note: The format is compatible with OpenLDAP's SSHA scheme if I'm not mistaken.

silasjpalmer at optusnet dot com dot au
14-Feb-2004 12:17


A user friendly example of hkmaly's XOR encryption / decryption functions which use MD5 hashing on the key.



<?php



  function bytexor($a,$b,$l)

  {

    $c="";

    for($i=0;$i<$l;$i++) {

      $c.=$a{$i}^$b{$i};

    }

    return($c);

  }



  function binmd5($val)

  {

    return(pack("H*",md5($val)));

  }



  function decrypt_md5($msg,$heslo)

  {

    $key=$heslo;$sifra="";

    $key1=binmd5($key);

    while($msg) {

      $m=substr($msg,0,16);

      $msg=substr($msg,16);

      $sifra.=$m=bytexor($m,$key1,16);

      $key1=binmd5($key.$key1.$m);

    }

    echo "\n";

    return($sifra);

  }



  function crypt_md5($msg,$heslo)

  {

    $key=$heslo;$sifra="";

    $key1=binmd5($key);

    while($msg) {

      $m=substr($msg,0,16);

      $msg=substr($msg,16);

      $sifra.=bytexor($m,$key1,16);

      $key1=binmd5($key.$key1.$m);

    }

    echo "\n";

    return($sifra);

  }



// Example of usage...



$message = "This is a very long message, but it is very secret and important 

and we need to keep the contents hidden from nasty people who might want to steal it.";



$key = "secret key";



$crypted = crypt_md5($message, $key);

echo "Encoded = $crypted<BR>"; // returns = `<H {.1{JV+je



$uncrypted = decrypt_md5($crypted, $key);

echo "Unencoded = $uncrypted"; // returns This is a very long message (etc)



?>

mina86 at tlen dot pl
13-Sep-2003 08:41


In respons to paj at pajhome dot org dot uk @ 21-May-2003 03:20:

In many cases, there is only hash of password saved on server, so JavaScript script must return:  md5(md5(password) + random)  and server must compare it with  md5(saved_md5 + random).

However, it might be less secure then sending plain password. Let say someone gaind read only access to your database (it doesn't matter how he did it). With such access he can read each user's reacord so he knows each user username and hash of password. With that knowledge, all he must do to hack your site is connect to server, read the random number, calculate  md5(hash_of_password_which_he_has_stolen + random)   and send it to server. Be aware of this issue if you think your database is not secure enought.

marc at NOSPAM dot giombetti dot com
08-Aug-2003 12:18


I use md5 to create a string that will be valid for X seconds!

One may use this function for cacheing reasons or even timeout functionality in a script.



/**

 * valid_for_x_minutes() : Gernates an md5 hash that will be the same for $timeout minutes

 * This function was intitialy used in combination with jpGraph to allow cacheing of multiple

 *  charts for a specified time.

 * 

 * @param $timeout - Timeout in minutes

 * @param $optional - An optional string to include to in the md5 string 

 * @return 

 */

function valid_for_x_minutes($timeout,$optional){

    if($timeout != "0"){

    $hours = date("H");

    $minutes = date("i");

    $tmpval = ceil($minutes/$timeout)*$timeout;

    if(!empty($optional)){

        return md5("$tmpval$optional");

    }else{

        return md5("$tmpval");

    }

    }else{

    return md5(time());

    }

}

paj at pajhome dot org dot uk
22-May-2003 06:20


Hi,



You can use the MD5 function in combination with a similar JavaScript function to protect user passwords for logins. The arrangement goes like this:



When the user requests the login page, the server generates a random number. It stores this in a session variable as well as sending to the client.



When the user clicks submit, JavaScript in the client computes md5(password + random).



The server can also generate this hash, because it already knows the password and random number. It uses this to check that the user entered the correct password.



The password has not been transmitted in the clear, and next login the random number will be different, so an attacker can't use a "replay attack".



JavaScript MD5 is available here: http://pajhome.org.uk/crypt/md5/



Paul

Shane Allen
15-Apr-2003 11:53


From the documentation on Digest::MD5:

md5($data,...)

This function will concatenate all arguments, calculate the MD5 digest of this "message", and return it in binary form.



md5_hex($data,...)

Same as md5(), but will return the digest in hexadecimal form. 



PHP's function returns the digest in hexadecimal form, so my guess is that you're using md5() instead of md5_hex(). I have verified that md5_hex() generates the same string as PHP's md5() function.



(original comment snipped in various places)

>Hexidecimal hashes generated with Perl's Digest::MD5 module WILL

>NOT equal hashes generated with php's md5() function if the input

>text contains any non-alphanumeric characters.

>

>$phphash = md5('pa$$');

>echo "php original hash from text: $phphash";

>echo "md5 hash from perl: " . $myrow['password'];

>

>outputs:

>

>php original hash from text: 0aed5d740d7fab4201e885019a36eace

>hash from perl: c18c9c57cb3658a50de06491a70b75cd

dmarsh dot no dot spam dot please at spscc dot ctc dot edu
03-Dec-2002 06:27


Recommended readed: OpenSSL from O'reilly! It has chapters on SSL and PHP!! but it also covers cryptography in more depth (chapters 1 and 2 are highly recommended to all here!). It has lots of good information! Talks in depth about lots of stuff that I cannot begin to explain here.



MD5 is a repeatable hashes / digest process. Taking something of unknown size or content and reducing it to a known size but retaining a high degree of unknown content. A good hash / digest is said to alter the output significantly 

changing ~50% of the bits in the "fixed-in-size" output stream) in the event of changing one bit (at random) from the "unknown-in-size" input stream (or even changing the length of the input stream by one bit*/byte, *=with padding if necessary)



MD5 is such a hash / digest. Other than that, it doesn't do much on it's own. 



MD5 is a cheap way to test a file transfer (like a CRC32). If either the file or the MD5 is downloaded with errors, the chances that the MD5 of the file and the "PUBLIC" copy of the MD5 will match is highly unlikely. Both would have to error in a highly unpredictable way. However relying of MD5s as a way to validate that the file hasn't been tamptered with (tainted) is not good. If you can download the file from one place and a public MD5 from a second place, you at least are using a 3rd party method to attempt to validate the file's contents against tainting.



MD5 can ONLY be used to validate the contents against tainting if there is something secret (private) between the two end-points.



Lets examine MD5 in a typical and extremely effective email validating process. The two parties via a trusted method exchange a word / phrase / password (something private) that hopefully nobody else knows.



The first party publically composes an email with an MD5. But instead of sending that MD5. the MD5 is used against this word / phrase / password (private) in a Message Authentication Code (MAC), or better Hash-MAC (HMAC) (see http://www.rsasecurity.com/rsalabs/faq/2-1-7.html)



One way would be to MD5 the word / phrase / password (private) part and the public part (the message body) as two different MD5's. the MD5 the two MD5s together as a single MD5 and send the composite MD5 in the public.



The receiver can (using all available parts, the private part, public part and the composite MD5) authenicate (testing against the computed part) the message hasn't been tampered during transit. The message body and the composite MD5 is sent in plain text, yet the contents have been authenicated with a high level of confidence. No encryption was used.



MD5 is often used to authenicate parts of encrypted streams and thus is the reason why many confuse MD5 as encryption (or even authenication) rather than what it is. A hash / digest.



An alternate to MD5 is SHA1. The output size of SHA1 is a little bigger (I think 164bits). More bits, means a higher degree of complexity. 128 bits is concidered minimim by experts in the field.... For cipher lengths and symmetric key sizes (due to computational power now available for brute force attacks).



--Doug

karlos dot gustavo at terra dot com dot br
01-Oct-2002 12:09


simple slappaswd MD5 hash generation:



$ldap_passwd = "{md5}".base64_encode(pack("H*",md5($password)));

mbabcock-php at fibrespeed dot net
28-Jun-2001 05:06


I must point out to all the people who read the notes this far that MD5 is _not_ encryption in a traditional sense.  Creating an MD5 digest (or hash) of a message simply creates 128 bits that can be used to almost positively identify that message or object in the future.  You use MD5 if you want to validate that information is true.  For example, you may ask a user to submit a message through a browser POST and save an MD5 of that message in a database for a preview function.  When the user submits it the second time, running the MD5 hash of the new version of the text and comparing it to the original MD5 in the database will tell you if the text has changed at all.  This is how MD5 is used -- it is _not_ for encrypting things so as to get the data back afterward -- the MD5 hash version does _not_ contain the data of the original in a new form.

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