Microsoft Cryptographic Providers—Release Notes

There are now two cryptographic service providers (CSP) available from Microsoft®. The Microsoft Base Cryptographic Provider was the initial provider, and is distributed with Microsoft CryptoAPI versions 1.0 and 2.0. Now there is the Microsoft Enhanced Cryptographic Provider that can be used with either version as well. Both Providers now incorporate additional functionality in some of the functions. Additionally, the Enhanced Cryptographic Provider provides for stronger security through longer keys and additional algorithms

Note  The Microsoft Enhanced Cryptographic Provider is currently available only within North America.

This document provides details on the following topics:

• Key length comparison for the Enhanced and Base Cryptographic Providers.
• Additional functionality when using salt values for 40-bit symmetric keys. The API functions affected are CryptGenKey, CryptDeriveKey, and CryptImportKey.
• New functionality provided in the CryptSetKeyParam, CryptGetKeyParam, and CryptGetProvParam functions.
• Security recommendations for signature operations.