Cannot find type System.Security.Cryptography.SHA256 on Windows Phone 8.1

Question

I'want to use SHA 256 encryption on windows phone 8.1 c# xaml. But i am getting the following error: Cannot find type System.Security.Cryptography.HashAlgorithm in module mscorlib.dll

And indeed System.Security.Cryptography is not available on Windows Phone (or windows 8 store). Windows.Security.Cryptography however is available, but I couldn't find this class there as well.

What i need to use SHA 256 encryption ? Is thereany dll for that ?

Thanks

Answer 1

It's a bit more difficult if you're doing Universal App. But to get you started

using Windows.Security.Cryptography;
using Windows.Security.Cryptography.Core;

HashAlgorithmProvider hap = HashAlgorithmProvider.OpenAlgorithm(HashAlgorithmNames.Sha256);   
CryptographicHash ch = hap.CreateHash();            

// read in bytes from file then append with ch.Append(data)           

Windows.Storage.Streams.IBuffer b_hash = ch.GetValueAndReset();       // hash it
string hash_string = CryptographicBuffer.EncodeToHexString(b_hash);   // encode it to a hex string for easy reading

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You have to create a HashAlgorithmProvider and provided it with the HashAlgorithm you want to use

see HashAlgorithmNames. namespace for all supported Hashes

Then you create a CryptographicHash from the above.

Then you add in bytes into the CryptographicHash using .Append(data)

Then you compute the hash.

Then you can encode it to a hex string if you like.

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Shameless Screenshot of my Hashing App :)

Click Here for Fullsize Image