MIT 150: The Top 50

Number 18: Protect yourself An approach to sending secure digital messages – like using your credit card number with an e-commerce site – was developed in 1977 by a trio of MIT professors: Ron Rivest , pictured, Adi Shamir , and Leonard Adleman . RSA (the initials of each of their last names) cryptography uses a “public key,” which can be known to anyone, to encrypt messages and a “private key,” which only the recipient has, to decrypt them. The trio eventually sold RSA Security to EMC Corp. for $2.1 billion.
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Number 18: Protect yourself

An approach to sending secure digital messages – like using your credit card number with an e-commerce site – was developed in 1977 by a trio of MIT professors: Ron Rivest, pictured, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman. RSA (the initials of each of their last names) cryptography uses a “public key,” which can be known to anyone, to encrypt messages and a “private key,” which only the recipient has, to decrypt them. The trio eventually sold RSA Security to EMC Corp. for $2.1 billion.