Advanced Encryption Technology

WinZip^® 9.0 or later and WinZip E-Mail Companion support 128- and 256-bit key AES encryption, which provide much greater cryptographic security than the traditional Zip 2.0 encryption method used in earlier versions of WinZip.

WinZip 12.0 introduces customizable password policies to configure password complexity requirements when using encryption in WinZip. Parameters for minimum password length and a required mixture of characters are user definable. The types of characters that can be specified are upper and lower case letters, numerals and symbols. System Administrators in enterprise environments can customize the MSI installation of WinZip to install password policy requirements that meet their organization's needs for password complexity. For more information visit the Password Policy page.

WinZip's advanced encryption (FIPS-197 certified) uses the Rijndael cryptographic algorithm which, in 2001, was specified by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) Publication 197 as the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES).

When properly implemented as a key component of an overall security protocol, the AES permits a very high degree of cryptographic security, yet is fast and efficient in operation.

WinZip's AES encryption is just as easy to use as traditional Zip 2.0 encryption: all you have to do is select the encryption method and specify your password.

In addition to the new AES encryption technology, WinZip provides a number of usability enhancements that make it easier for you to use encryption. Most noticeably, you can now easily encrypt the files that are already in a Zip file; previously, files could be encrypted only while they were being added to the Zip file.

Note:
Recipients to whom you send AES-encrypted Zip files must have a compatible Zip file utility in order to decrypt the files. We have published the full specification for creating WinZip-compatible AES-encrypted Zip files, and we expect that other Zip file utility vendors will provide support for the format.

WinZip is also able to read password-protected AES-encrypted files created by PKZIP for Microsoft Windows.