CryptoAPI

Windows CryptoAPI

CryptoAPI is a Microsoft API (application programming interface) that provides services to enable developers to secure Microsoft Windows-based applications using cryptography. It is a set of dynamically-linked libraries that provides an abstraction layer which isolates programmers from the code used to encrypt the data.

CryptoAPI supports both public-key and symmetric key cryptography. It includes functionality for encrypting and decrypting data and for authentication using digital certificates.

CryptoAPI works with a number of CSPs (Cryptography Service Providers) installed on the machine. CSPs are the modules that do the actual work of encoding and decoding data by performing the cryptographic functions.

Linux CryptoAPI

CryptoAPI is also used in the Linux kernel (2.4.12+ and 2.6.x) as an interface for e.g. the cryptoloop module, which is used for mounting encrypted filesystems.