CryptoAPI

For the Linux cryptographic API, see Crypto API.

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.