Classical Cryptography Simulator

Message Authentication Code (MAC)

Interactive simulation of MAC generation and verification. Learn about HMAC, CMAC, and how message integrity is ensured in cryptographic systems.

MAC Generation
Generate a Message Authentication Code for your message

Hash-based MAC using SHA-256

MAC Verification
Verify the integrity of a received message
Control Panel
About MAC
Understanding Message Authentication Codes

What is MAC?

A Message Authentication Code is a short piece of information used to authenticate a message and to provide integrity and authenticity assurances on the message.

Key Properties

  • • Uses symmetric key cryptography
  • • Provides message integrity
  • • Provides message authentication
  • • Small and fixed size
MAC Algorithms
Common MAC implementations

HMAC

Hash-based MAC. Combines a cryptographic hash function with a secret key.

CMAC

Cipher-based MAC. Uses block cipher algorithms for MAC generation.

PMAC

Parallelizable MAC. Allows parallel computation for better performance.

MAC Applications
Where MAC is used in real-world systems

Network Security

  • • IPsec
  • • TLS/SSL
  • • VPN protocols

Financial Systems

  • • Bank transactions
  • • Payment systems
  • • ATM communications

Digital Signatures

  • • Document signing
  • • Code signing
  • • Email authentication