MD5 notes

MD5

MD5 is a well-known cryptographic hashing algorithm that takes any byte sequence and converts it into a fixed-size 128-bit value.

While it’s computationally fast, which contributes to its popularity, this speed also makes it vulnerable to brute-force attacks. Due to its widespread use, there are databases of pre-computed MD5 hashes, making it even easier to look up and crack.

MD5 is no longer considered secure and should not be used for cryptographic purposes. However, it still serves a useful function as a checksum, which can be used to verify the integrity of a file, ensuring that it hasn’t been altered during transmission or download.

You calculate MD5 hash of file with md5sum (pre-installed in most linux distro):

md5sum md5.md
037f2804346aa3f24868364d16e190e0  md5.md