crypto-js

What is crypto-js?

The crypto-js npm package is a library of cryptographic algorithms implemented in JavaScript. It's commonly used for secure encryption and decryption of data, hashing, and generating secure random bytes. It's suitable for both server-side and client-side applications in JavaScript.

What are crypto-js's main functionalities?

Encryption and Decryption

This feature allows you to encrypt and decrypt messages using various algorithms like AES, DES, Triple DES, Rabbit, and RC4. The code sample demonstrates how to encrypt and decrypt a message using AES.

{"encrypt": "CryptoJS.AES.encrypt('my message', 'secret key').toString()", "decrypt": "CryptoJS.AES.decrypt(encryptedMessage, 'secret key').toString(CryptoJS.enc.Utf8)"}

Hashing

Crypto-js can be used to hash data using algorithms like SHA-256, SHA-512, MD5, and more. The code sample shows how to hash a message using SHA-256 and SHA-512.

{"SHA256": "CryptoJS.SHA256('message').toString()", "SHA512": "CryptoJS.SHA512('message').toString()"}

HMAC (Hash-based Message Authentication Code)

This feature provides a way to verify both the data integrity and the authenticity of a message with a secret key. The code sample demonstrates generating an HMAC with the SHA-256 algorithm.

{"HMAC": "CryptoJS.HmacSHA256('message', 'secret').toString()"}

Progressive Ciphering

For large amounts of data, progressive ciphering allows you to encrypt or decrypt data in chunks rather than all at once. The code sample demonstrates how to encrypt data progressively.

{"progressiveCiphering": "var aesEncryptor = CryptoJS.algo.AES.createEncryptor('secret key', { iv: CryptoJS.enc.Hex.parse('0000000000000000') }); var ciphertextPart1 = aesEncryptor.process('part1 '); var ciphertextPart2 = aesEncryptor.process('part2 '); var ciphertextPart3 = aesEncryptor.process('part3 '); var ciphertextPart4 = aesEncryptor.finalize(); var encryptedMessage = ciphertextPart1.concat(ciphertextPart2).concat(ciphertextPart3).concat(ciphertextPart4).toString();"}

Secure Random Bytes Generation

Crypto-js can generate secure random bytes, which are useful for creating salts, keys, and other cryptographic elements. The code sample shows how to generate a random 16-byte string.

{"randomBytes": "CryptoJS.lib.WordArray.random(16).toString()"}

Other packages similar to crypto-js

bcryptjs

bcryptjs is a pure JavaScript implementation of the bcrypt password hashing function. It is useful for securely storing passwords. Unlike crypto-js, which offers a variety of cryptographic operations, bcryptjs focuses specifically on password hashing and is often used for this purpose in web applications.

node-forge

node-forge is a native JavaScript implementation of various networking and cryptography tools including TLS, SSH, and various cryptographic algorithms. It is similar to crypto-js but offers additional features like TLS and SSH protocol support, making it suitable for more complex cryptographic tasks.

libsodium-wrappers

libsodium-wrappers provides a high-level API for libsodium, a modern and easy-to-use crypto library. It offers similar functionalities to crypto-js but focuses on high-performance operations and is based on the NaCl library, which is designed to be fast and secure.

README

crypto-js

JavaScript library of crypto standards.

Discontinued

Active development of CryptoJS has been discontinued. This library is no longer maintained.

Nowadays, NodeJS and modern browsers have a native Crypto module. The latest version of CryptoJS already uses the native Crypto module for random number generation, since Math.random() is not crypto-safe. Further development of CryptoJS would result in it only being a wrapper of native Crypto. Therefore, development and maintenance has been discontinued, it is time to go for the native crypto module.

Node.js (Install)

Requirements:

• Node.js
• npm (Node.js package manager)

npm install crypto-js

Usage

ES6 import for typical API call signing use case:

import sha256 from 'crypto-js/sha256';
import hmacSHA512 from 'crypto-js/hmac-sha512';
import Base64 from 'crypto-js/enc-base64';

const message, nonce, path, privateKey; // ...
const hashDigest = sha256(nonce + message);
const hmacDigest = Base64.stringify(hmacSHA512(path + hashDigest, privateKey));

Modular include:

var AES = require("crypto-js/aes");
var SHA256 = require("crypto-js/sha256");
...
console.log(SHA256("Message"));

Including all libraries, for access to extra methods:

var CryptoJS = require("crypto-js");
console.log(CryptoJS.HmacSHA1("Message", "Key"));

Client (browser)

Requirements:

• Node.js
• Bower (package manager for frontend)

bower install crypto-js

Usage

Modular include:

require.config({
    packages: [
        {
            name: 'crypto-js',
            location: 'path-to/bower_components/crypto-js',
            main: 'index'
        }
    ]
});

require(["crypto-js/aes", "crypto-js/sha256"], function (AES, SHA256) {
    console.log(SHA256("Message"));
});

Including all libraries, for access to extra methods:

// Above-mentioned will work or use this simple form
require.config({
    paths: {
        'crypto-js': 'path-to/bower_components/crypto-js/crypto-js'
    }
});

require(["crypto-js"], function (CryptoJS) {
    console.log(CryptoJS.HmacSHA1("Message", "Key"));
});

Usage without RequireJS

<script type="text/javascript" src="path-to/bower_components/crypto-js/crypto-js.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
    var encrypted = CryptoJS.AES(...);
    var encrypted = CryptoJS.SHA256(...);
</script>

API

See: https://cryptojs.gitbook.io/docs/

AES Encryption

Plain text encryption

var CryptoJS = require("crypto-js");

// Encrypt
var ciphertext = CryptoJS.AES.encrypt('my message', 'secret key 123').toString();

// Decrypt
var bytes  = CryptoJS.AES.decrypt(ciphertext, 'secret key 123');
var originalText = bytes.toString(CryptoJS.enc.Utf8);

console.log(originalText); // 'my message'

Object encryption

var CryptoJS = require("crypto-js");

var data = [{id: 1}, {id: 2}]

// Encrypt
var ciphertext = CryptoJS.AES.encrypt(JSON.stringify(data), 'secret key 123').toString();

// Decrypt
var bytes  = CryptoJS.AES.decrypt(ciphertext, 'secret key 123');
var decryptedData = JSON.parse(bytes.toString(CryptoJS.enc.Utf8));

console.log(decryptedData); // [{id: 1}, {id: 2}]

List of modules

• crypto-js/core
• crypto-js/x64-core
• crypto-js/lib-typedarrays

---

• crypto-js/md5
• crypto-js/sha1
• crypto-js/sha256
• crypto-js/sha224
• crypto-js/sha512
• crypto-js/sha384
• crypto-js/sha3
• crypto-js/ripemd160

---

• crypto-js/hmac-md5
• crypto-js/hmac-sha1
• crypto-js/hmac-sha256
• crypto-js/hmac-sha224
• crypto-js/hmac-sha512
• crypto-js/hmac-sha384
• crypto-js/hmac-sha3
• crypto-js/hmac-ripemd160

---

• crypto-js/pbkdf2

---

• crypto-js/aes
• crypto-js/tripledes
• crypto-js/rc4
• crypto-js/rabbit
• crypto-js/rabbit-legacy
• crypto-js/evpkdf

---

• crypto-js/format-openssl
• crypto-js/format-hex

---

• crypto-js/enc-latin1
• crypto-js/enc-utf8
• crypto-js/enc-hex
• crypto-js/enc-utf16
• crypto-js/enc-base64

---

• crypto-js/mode-cfb
• crypto-js/mode-ctr
• crypto-js/mode-ctr-gladman
• crypto-js/mode-ofb
• crypto-js/mode-ecb

---

• crypto-js/pad-pkcs7
• crypto-js/pad-ansix923
• crypto-js/pad-iso10126
• crypto-js/pad-iso97971
• crypto-js/pad-zeropadding
• crypto-js/pad-nopadding

Release notes

4.2.0

Change default hash algorithm and iteration's for PBKDF2 to prevent weak security by using the default configuration.

Custom KDF Hasher

Blowfish support

4.1.1

Fix module order in bundled release.

Include the browser field in the released package.json.

4.1.0

Added url safe variant of base64 encoding. 357

Avoid webpack to add crypto-browser package. 364

4.0.0

This is an update including breaking changes for some environments.

In this version Math.random() has been replaced by the random methods of the native crypto module.

For this reason CryptoJS might not run in some JavaScript environments without native crypto module. Such as IE 10 or before or React Native.

3.3.0

Rollback, 3.3.0 is the same as 3.1.9-1.

The move of using native secure crypto module will be shifted to a new 4.x.x version. As it is a breaking change the impact is too big for a minor release.

3.2.1

The usage of the native crypto module has been fixed. The import and access of the native crypto module has been improved.

3.2.0

In this version Math.random() has been replaced by the random methods of the native crypto module.

For this reason CryptoJS might does not run in some JavaScript environments without native crypto module. Such as IE 10 or before.

If it's absolute required to run CryptoJS in such an environment, stay with 3.1.x version. Encrypting and decrypting stays compatible. But keep in mind 3.1.x versions still use Math.random() which is cryptographically not secure, as it's not random enough.

This version came along with CRITICAL BUG.

DO NOT USE THIS VERSION! Please, go for a newer version!

3.1.x

The 3.1.x are based on the original CryptoJS, wrapped in CommonJS modules.