ABSTRACT
Advances in cryptology have followed many notable changes in direction over the centuries, for example, the use of polyalphabetic over monoalphabetic ciphers begun by Alberti in the 1400s, and the use of mathematics in cryptology begun by Friedman and Hill in the early 1900s. The rapid progress in technology that our society achieved over the last several decades, specifically in computing, has had a dramatic effect on our abilities in cryptology. This effect is felt not just on classical ciphers though. While classical ciphers, even those considered progressive in their time, are indeed often easy to implement and analyze through the use of technology, recent progress in technology has also given rise to an entirely new kind of cipher, and yet another change in direction for the subject of cryptology itself. This change began in 1976, when Stanford University graduate student Whitfield Diffie and his faculty mentor Martin Hellman published a paper, aptly titled New Directions in Cryptography [6], in which they described the idea of a public-key cipher.
