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https://github.com/fernet/spec/blob/master/Spec.md

It's just a simple format specification using standard crypto primitives.

> AES in CBC mode with a 128-bit key for encryption; using PKCS7 padding.

> HMAC using SHA256 for authentication.



What is it then really? This sounds like a wrapper function…


Yep, it's a wrapper around some cryptographic primitives that is fairly misuse-resistant. It's not hard to screw up using the individual primitives in such a way that you lose the desirable cryptographic properties (for example, not authenticating the IV, making the plaintext vulnerable to CBC bitflip attacks); it's harder to screw up using Fernet.


It’s a high-level interface for authenticated encryption.

Calling it an algorithm is like calling HTTP an algorithm; it’s true in the most useless sense.




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