Creating RIPEMD-160 Checksums in Linux
August 29, 2020 —
Jt Spratley
RIPEMD (RIPE Message Digest) isn't as popular as SHA and MD5 for creating cryptographic hashes, or checksums. But I got curious after reading about it during some cybersecurity training. The md5sum and sha (256, 512, etc.) command-line hash (CLI) tools are pre-installed on many Linux distros. But I didn't see one for RIPEMD.
I found the answer on a StackOverflow thread and OpenSSL.org - the openssl CLI app.
openssl dgst -rmd160 file
RMD160 is the only option with the openssl app from what I see. But there are 128, 160, 256, 320 bit options out there. Since 128 considered insecure, 160 seems alright for knowing it's out there. If I needed RIPEMD256 or RIPEMD320, I could easily use GTK Hash.
Maybe I'll look into Blowfish hashes next.
Tags: cybersecurity, linux
