Question

Explain the difference between stream cipher and block cipher.

Answer 1

Parameter                                 Stream Cipher                                                 Block Cipher.

How does it work?         Stream cipher operates on small plaintext units           Block cipher works on large data blocks.

Code requirement          It requires less code.                                                     It requires more code.

Usage of key                  Key is used only once.                                                  Reuse of key is possible.

Application                     Secure Socket layer.                                                      File encryption and database.

Usage              Stream cipher is used to implement hardware.                           Block cipher is used to implement software.